


Valentine's Day Frenzy

by Night_Witch_The_Third



Series: Here's to Never Growing Up [1]
Category: South Park
Genre: Aggressive kissing, Awkward Flirting, Awkward Kissing, Awkward Romance, Awkwardness, Carnival, Denial, Eric Cartman Being Eric Cartman, Falling In Love, Love at First Sight, Love/Hate, Multi, One-Sided Attraction, Revenge, School Dances, Slow Dancing, Stalking, Unrequited Love, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2018-12-20 14:49:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 63,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11923182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Night_Witch_The_Third/pseuds/Night_Witch_The_Third
Summary: Cartman is convinced that he is in love with Kyle, but he has to compete with the new girl at school, who also has a crush on him.  And Stan has a crush on the new girl, but Wendy still has feelings for her ex.  So Cartman is jealous of the new girl, Stan is jealous of Kyle, the new girl and Wendy are jealous of each other, Kyle is blissfully ignorant to all of it, and Kenny somehow has to be the peace keeper between all of them.





	1. Cartman is forced to see a therapist and things get immediately weird

**Author's Note:**

> So, I’ve been watching a lot of South Park since I’ve moved to college and don’t have anything better to do since classes haven’t begun yet. I’m now in love with the show and had three similar ideas for a fan fiction and decided to lump them all together. We’ll see how all this goes. I’m going to take a more cynical look at some of my least favorite romance clichés, and I thought South Park would be perfect for it.
> 
> "Singing radio head at the top of our lungs..."

“Okay, so tell me why you’re here,” Dr. Quinn Pidd said as she sat down in her giant chair. Across from her, sitting on the couch and looking confused and annoyed at the same time was Eric Cartman, who was rolling his eyes.  
“Why the fuck do I have to tell you?” he growled. “You’re the psychic, you tell me!”  
Dr. Pidd laughed and pat Cartman on the head. “Oh, silly Eric,” she replied as he muttered “Don’t touch me” under his breath. “I’m not a psychic! I’m a psychiatrist! I do know why you’re here, but I’d like to hear you say it yourself so that you know why you’re here.”  
“Because Mr. Mackey took a year off to find spiritual enlightenment so they sent me to you,” Cartman replied, still sounding annoyed. He didn’t like how this lady was using a high-pitched voice as if she was talking to a cute pet or baby.  
“So, what did you do to get yourself sent here?” she asked him, never losing the creepy smile.  
“Well, apparently, according to my teachers, I’m ‘psychotic’ and ‘anti-social’ with a ‘total lack of empathy for other people’s feelings’ or some bullshit like that,” Cartman told her, putting air quotes in his words. “I have no idea what they’re talking about.”  
“And what exactly did you do to make them say that?” she wondered.  
“Well, I tried to crucify Kyle yesterday with the tetherball pole, yesterday,” he replied. Only a shift of her eyes brows showed that Dr. Pidd was shocked by what he said. “I think he deserves it, really. Being all Jewish and shit. And he kept contradicting me during history class when I was telling the class about the greatness of Hitler.”  
“That’s a pretty cruel thing to do to someone out of nowhere, don’t you think?” Pidd asked him seriously (or as seriously as she could while still using the condescending pet tone). Cartman blinked at her.  
“No, I pick on him all the time,” he replied. “It’s our thing.”  
“What do you mean?” she asked, sounding slightly shocked. Rolling his eyes again, Cartman recounted every single episode of the series in which he and Kyle had a “spat,” talking in great detail so the author wouldn’t have to, while the new psychiatrist whose name the author made up at the top of her head listened in what might have been horror if she would just stop with the creepy smile.  
“And then I said, ‘Back off you fucking Jew!’ and um, he totally did,” Cartman finished, sitting back with a self-satisfied grin on his face. “Yup, good times.”  
The therapist didn’t speak for a moment as she paused to write a few things down on the notepad she had seemingly gotten from nowhere. Cartman sat there, feeling awkward at the silence, so eventually he decided to speak.  
“So, obviously you can see that there is absolutely nothing wrong with me and I don’t need to be here,” he said, standing and slowly inching towards the door. Dr. Pidd looked up and Cartman froze. Her creepy smile had become wider.  
“Why of course there’s nothing wrong with you,” she said in a more sing song voice. Cartman blinked in confusion, having no idea how to react. “Something wonderful is in you!”  
“What the fuck are you talking about?” he muttered, inching a little closer to the door. But her next words made him stop dead in his tracks.  
“Why, obviously you’re in love with your friend, Kyle!”


	2. The New Girl, Cartman, and Stan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because my sister demanded it, here’s the next chapter. Hopefully it will be longer than the last one. And hopefully you enjoy it as well.  
> “With the Boom Box blaring as we’re falling in love…”

Cartman stared wide-eyed at Dr. Pidd for a long moment before finally, he burst into laughter. Pidd continued to smile at him as he rolled around on the floor, laughing hysterically. Finally, he sat up in a fit of giggles, wiping a tear from his eye. Then he noticed that the therapist was still giving him the creepy smile. They stared at each other for a moment before understanding finally dawned on him.  
“Oh, you were being serious,” Cartman muttered. “You were actually listening when I was recounting over twenty seasons worth of conflict between me and him, right?”  
“Yes, I did,” she replied in a tone like she was trying to teach a dog how to sit. “Don’t you know how love works? I mean think about it. All great love stories start out with the couples hating each other! They think that all of the negative attention comes from hatred, but what they, and by extension, you, don’t realize is that all this does not come from feelings of hate, but feelings of true love!”  
Cartman opened his mouth to argue some more, but then really thought about it. He had seen a fair number of romantic comedies in his day (totally to make fun of them, not because he enjoyed them or anything), and it was true that the couples in those movies always thought they hated each other, but then ended up falling in love. Suddenly, he shook his head.  
“No way,” he growled. “I hate that fucking Jew! There’s no way I have a thing for him!”  
“Come now, Eric,” Dr. Pidd said patiently. “Think of all the past episodes where you two have interacted. That’s a lot of attention to put on someone, you know, and it’s not even always negative. Like when you said you saved him from the smug storm that was destroying San Francisco…”  
“That was only so I could make fun of him some more,” Cartman muttered, trying to defend himself. “Butters wouldn’t fight back.”  
“Invading his personal space,” Dr. Pidd continued, looking down at her list. “Saving his life on multiple occasions… oh, and I see here that in a couple episodes you told him that you love him.”  
“THAT WAS TAKEN COMPLETELY OUT OF CONTEXT!” Cartman shouted. “I only said that out of gratitude and because I was trying to set up two kids who were meant to be with each other! Obviously.”  
“What about this time when you went to Imagination Land and saved his life?”  
“That was only so he could suck my balls,” Cartman explained. Pidd’s eyebrow cocked slightly and Cartman stared at her for a long moment, his eyes widening. “Oh my God, maybe I do have something for him.”  
“It’s okay,” Dr. Pidd told him. “Lots of people go through what you’re going through right now. Thinking that they hate someone when it’s actually true love. You just have to learn to accept it and confess your true feelings for him.”  
“If I say you might be right, can I go?” Cartman asked, fed up with this entire thing.  
“Of course!” she replied happily.  
“You know, you might be right,” Cartman said, going back towards the door again. “Bye.”  
“I’d like you to come back and see me again on Monday,” Dr. Pidd called after him. Cartman immediately stopped again.  
“Aw come on!” he growled. She didn’t change her expression. “All right fine,” he muttered. “But only so I can prove how wrong you are.” Then he finally left with the doctor saying a cheery “farewell!” after him.  
Cartman angrily walked into the hall muttering to himself and slammed the door behind him. When he looked up, let out a cry of fright. Stan, Kyle, and Kenny were standing there, staring at him wide eyed in either confusion or shock (he couldn’t really tell at the moment).  
“What the fuck are you guys doing here?” he asked, half way between anger and nervousness.  
“You told us to stand here and wait for you, remember?” Stan reminded him. “We were sitting on the bench and then we heard you laughing hysterically for, like, ten whole minutes.”  
“What happened in there that made you laugh so hard?” Kyle wondered.  
“Oh, well, um,” Cartman blustered. “She told me this…really funny…joke.”  
“Seriously?” Stan asked, smiling. “Can we hear it?”  
“No, I completely forgot how it went,” he replied immediately.  
“And what was taken out of context?” Kenny asked in his muffled voice. “We heard you shout that too.”  
“None of your fucking business,” Cartman growled at him. Hesitantly, he added, “So, did you guys hear anything else?”  
“No,” Stan replied, exchanging a confused glance with Kyle. “Why, were we supposed to?” Immediately Cartman snapped.  
“GOD, WILL YOU JUST MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS?” he snarled at him. Then he ran off angrily. Before the three of them could even blink he immediately ran back to them, completely calm again. “So, the new Star Wars movie is out,” he said, glancing at Kyle. “You wanna go see it tomorrow after school?”  
Kyle gave a confused glance to Stan, who could do nothing but shrug his shoulders. “Yeah sure,” he replied finally. “Why not?”  
“I think I have homework to d-” Kenny started, but Cartman was already walking away.  
“OK, cool,” he called over his shoulder. “See you guys tomorrow.” And he turned the corner, leaving his friends to just stare after him in confusion.

“All right class,” Mr. Garrison said to a bored classroom the next day. “Starting today we have a new student, so make sure you make her feel welcome.” He gestured to a red-headed girl with blonde streaks in her hair standing next to him. “This is Angela Begara. Try not to mess her up. Angela, you can take a seat next to Stan over there.”  
The girl curtsied to the class. “Hello, everyone,” she said, sweetly. “It certainly is a pleasure to meet you all. I hope we can get along.” Then she went over and sat down at the empty desk that the teacher had showed her.  
“Hi,” Stan greeted her. “I’m Stan.”  
“Hello, Stan,” Angela said with a winning smile.  
“Oh great!” Cartman snarled loudly for everyone to hear. “Now we’ve got another…” Then he froze, mid-rant, wide-eyed, as if he couldn’t think of anything to complain about with the new girl. Her red hair? No, Kyle would be offended. The fact that she was a girl? What if people got the wrong idea!?!  
The entire class stared at him in shocked silence, waiting for him to go on, but he continued to stand there, seemingly turning into a human statue. Then, after a good two minutes of total silence, Cartman got up from his desk and quietly walked out of the room without saying another word.  
“Dude,” Butters said at last, voicing everyone else’s thoughts. “What the hell was that about?”  
_______________________________________________________

Cartman paced back and forth at the movie theatre, glancing down the street every few seconds. Maybe he should have given an actual time instead of just saying vaguely “sometime after school.”  
Thankfully, at that moment, he saw Kyle turn around the corner, and Cartman smiled excitedly. Unfortunately, a moment later, he was followed by Stan and Kenny, obviously coming over together and it wasn’t just a coincidence that they were walking in the same direction. Frowning, Cartman went over to meet them.  
“Dudes, what the fuck are you doing here?” he hissed at them.  
The three of them blinked in surprise. “You invited us,” Kyle pointed out calmly. “Remember? Yesterday?”  
“GOD DAMN IT!” Cartman hollered suddenly. “THAT’S NOT WHAT I- I WASN’T TALKING ABOUT… AW, YOU GUYS RUIN EVERYTHING!” Then he stormed off in a huff. There were a few moments of silence as the three of them stared in confusion after him, then he slowly came back, completely calm again. “Okay, so let’s go watch the movie,” he told them calmly, ushering them in.  
Inside the theatre, there was quite a crowd of people. Most of them were obvious Star Wars geeks, dressed up in Star Wars gear, and they saw that even a few of their fellow classmates. Most of them were guys, but there were a few girls, but only one they recognized.  
“Dude, what is the new girl doing here?” Kyle wondered when he spotted her. Stan glanced at her and waved her over.  
“I invited her,” he told them. “We were talking during class, and she mentioned that she liked Star Wars, so I thought I’d invite her to see the movie with us.”  
“Why would you do that?” Kenny asked, frowning (though you couldn’t really tell).  
“I just told you,” Stan replied, rolling his eyes. “She likes Star Wars. And I was being nice. She’s new here, remember?”  
“Hi guys!” Angela happily greeted, to half-hearted mumbles from the boys. “If I remember right, you’re Kenny, Kyle and Eric, right? Stan was telling me about you guys.”  
“How did you two manage an entire conversation during class?” Kyle wondered. Before Stan could reply, Cartman angrily stepped in.  
“Can we get our tickets before we lose our seats to some of these losers?” he asked, shoving his friends right along to the front of the line. They got their tickets, ordered snacks, then went into the dark theatre.  
They found a row of empty seats that would allow the five of them to sit together, and they started filing into the row. Kenny went first, then Kyle, but before Angela could follow him, Cartman immediately stepped in front of her and shoved her out of the way. Stan glared after him, helping Angela to her feet.  
As the stupid commercials for the theatre began, Kenny heard Cartman start muttering angrily under his breath. It was kind of distracting and he couldn’t make out what he was saying. Maybe he was grumbling about having to share all of the snacks, or being forced to hold the popcorn since he was sitting in the middle. He wasn’t sure. With Cartman, it could be anything, really.  
“I wonder what was up with Cartman today,” Kenny whispered to Kyle.  
“Yeah,” Kyle replied in a low voice, keeping his eyes on the screen. “Usually he jumps at the chance to insult someone. Especially if it’s someone with a trait he can’t stand.”  
“Maybe he has a crush on her,” Kenny guessed, glancing past Kyle to where Cartman had already eaten most of the popcorn. Kyle tried not to laugh.  
“Yeah right,” he said. “The day Cartman has a crush on someone is the day I sprout wings and fly. Seriously, I think he may be up to something. Something sinister.”  
“That does sound more realistic,” Kenny replied, and he couldn’t decide if he was being sarcastic in his own statement or not. They couldn’t say anything more on the subject, because at that moment the previews started to play, and since someone somewhere decided a long time ago that all previews were allowed to be as loud as the loudest part of the loudest movie, they were immediately blasted into their seats, and couldn’t hear a single thing. (And clearly the author had seen Tiny Toons when she was young and decided to steal one of their jokes, because a moment later, a screen with a block of text stating that “The Audience is Now Deaf” appeared on screen when the previews were finally over.) Then the movie started to play and pushed all other thoughts from the two boys’ minds.  
Meanwhile, Cartman was annoyed to find that to his left, Kenny and Kyle were whispering to each other and not him, and to his right, Stan and the new girl would not shut up. Even when the previews began, at least Kyle and Kenny had the decency to quiet down, but the two to his right would not stop whispering and giggling to each other. It made him sick. It wasn’t even mostly Star Wars related stuff they were whispering about! Why did Stan have to invite a girl anyways?

“Wow, they really will just make a movie out any part of Star Wars, won’t they?” Kyle asked as they came out of the movie theatre about two hours later.  
“Seriously,” Stan agreed. “I don’t even remember that stuff being in the original trilogy!”  
“Of course not,” Angela replied, coming to stand next to them. “Hans shot first, remember? This movie was obviously based on the re-edited version! But I enjoyed it anyways. Thanks for inviting me along!” She started walking away, but Stan started after her.  
“Hey wait, I’ll walk you home,” he told her. She smiled sweetly at him in reply. Frowning, Kyle walked over to them with Kenny trailing behind him.  
“Yeah, we’ll all walk you home,” he said, following behind them. Cartman, who had started walking off in the other direction, immediately turned around and followed after his friends. Angela shrugged and continued walking down the path with the boys following her.  
Cartman increased his step until he was walking next to Kyle, and nudged him in the arm.  
“Dude, I don’t like how much time Stan’s been hanging around with the new girl,” he told him in a low voice. “I don’t like it at all.”  
“Why not?” Kenny asked, overhearing him and quickening his step so he was walking next to them. Seeing this as a chance to either confirm or deny his theory, he added, “Do you have a crush on- “  
“WHAT!?! NO! OF COURSE, I DON’T! I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT!” Cartman shouted, making the others stop and stare at him. “I mean, I have to go.” And then he walked off without another word.  
After a long moment of staring after him in total silence, Kenny turned to Kyle. “See?” he said. “I told you, he has a crush. You owe me fifty bucks.” Kyle blinked at him in confusion.  
“Did we bet on this?” he asked, a note of suspicion in his voice. Kenny thought for a moment.  
“Let’s say yes,” he replied, earning only a glare from his friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that’s where I’m going to end it for now. This chapter has gone on too long. Next time, we’re going to find out what Wendy thinks of the new girl and why she wasn’t mentioned at all in this episode. I hope you like it, and remember, if you don’t review, I can’t write, so read and review. Especially since I’m immune to the plot and can transcend time and space. And if you don’t review, I’ll come after you. You can figure out the rest. HAVE FUN…


	3. Some Shit's going down! Be ready for it!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I’ve been watching South Park while writing about South Park, so that should be fun. That’s all I’ve really got to say. Today, we’ll be seeing how Wendy reacts to the new girl and what’s been going on with Stan (as if you didn’t already know). And hopefully I’ll stop breaking the fourth wall so much. But probably not. Enjoy.
> 
> “Got a bottle of whatever, but it’s getting us drunk…”

“Well class,” Mr. Garrison said to a half asleep class the next day. “As we all know, Valentine’s Day is coming up.” His news was met with collective groans from the few children who were still awake enough to react. “And the school has decided to throw a Valentine’s day festival. There’s going to be a fair,” the children started to perk up at this, “and a school dance!” The groan became even louder. “You can ask that special someone to the dance, and there’s going to be karaoke as well!” This was met by silence.  
“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” Stan spoke up at last.  
“Seriously,” Kyle agreed. “Who would want to humiliate themselves in front of the entire school by singing karaoke?”  
“Er, yeah,” Tweek agreed reluctantly. “Karaoke is just the worst…”  
Before anyone else could add their opinion to the matter, Wendy walked in through the door and walked over to stand in the front of the class.  
“Hey guys!” she greeted, almost creepily robotic. “Sorry I’m late. I was sick yesterday and that’s why I wasn’t here. Yup, that’s it. I was just sick. So, if you wondering why I wasn’t here, that’s why.”  
“Thank you, Wendy,” Mr. Garrison replied. “Now take your seat.”  
Wendy walked over to her desk, but before she could sit down, she immediately noticed the new girl sitting in between Stan and Kyle. Frowning, instead of sitting down, she walked over to them. She put on an incredibly fake, passive-aggressive smile and looked directly at Stan.  
“Stan,” she said slowly, “Who is this?”  
Neither Stan nor Kyle seemed willing to answer her, gaping in horror at the look on her face, and the new girl decided to answer for them.  
“Hi!” Angela greeted her cheerfully. “I’m Angela! Angela Begara! I started school here just yesterday!” Wendy’s eye twitched.  
“Nice to meet you,” she replied. “I’m Wendy. Stan and I used to date.” Stan slammed his face down on his desk.  
“ANGELA!” Cartman suddenly blurted out, making everyone jump. “I hate her because her name is Angela! That’s a stupid name! Who would ever be named that!?! Man, that was bugging me.”  
The class was once more forced to stare in shock at Cartman’s outburst, but he looked rather pleased with himself. Then Kyle spoke up.  
“I don’t know,” he replied. “I kind of like the name Angela.”  
“GOD DAMN IT!” Cartman cried, and he stormed out of the room again.  
“Okay, so we’re going to need to some people to volunteer to plan the dance,” Mr. Garrison continued, as if nothing had interrupted him and ignoring the shocked stares of his students. “Since I know none of you are going to volunteer, I’ve already picked who will be on the planning committee. Angela, you’re the new girl, so you have to be on it. I’ve also chosen Kyle, Wendy and Butters.” The students he named let out a collective groan of annoyance. Just then, Cartman came back into the room, much calmer than when he left it.  
“Mr. Garrison, I would like to be on the committee too, please,” he said in the nicest voice he could muster while trying not to look at his fellow students. Mr. Garrison, Stan, Kyle and everyone else in the class could do nothing but stare in shock for a moment.  
“Um, sure, of course you can be on it, Eric,” he replied after a moment of hesitation. “But why would you want to?”  
Cartman stared up at him for a moment, frowning. Then he walked back to his desk muttering “Man, nobody can mind their own fucking business anymore.”

Later that night, Kyle sat in his room, talking on the phone with Stan.  
“I have no idea what he’s been up to,” Kyle said to his friend. “Kenny thinks he has a crush on the new girl, but I don’t know. He doesn’t seem the type.”  
“Yeah,” Stan’s voice came in, sounding distracted. “I have no idea what’s wrong with Cartman.”  
“I have no idea what’s right with him,” Kyle replied, shaking his head. “And what’s been up with you lately anyways?” A long pause came from the other end.  
“What do you mean?” Stan asked eventually. Kyle rolled his eyes, which he was glad Stan couldn’t see.  
“Dude, don’t think I haven’t noticed,” he said sternly. “You’ve been hanging around the new girl like a dog. You even asked her to come to the movies with us! You totally like her, don’t you?” There was another moment of silence.  
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Stan muttered through the phone. Kyle let out an annoyed sigh.  
“Come on, dude,” he urged him. “You can like more than one girl. It’s all right if you like the new girl, you know.”  
“Really?” Stan replied, a note of shock in his voice. “You don’t care that I have a crush on Angela?”  
“Why would I care?” Kyle replied, rolling his eyes again. Stan’s reply was drowned out by Kyle’s mother calling up to him that it was time for dinner. “Sorry, dude, I have to go.” And then he hung up after Stan’s short good-bye. He made his way down the stairs and started towards the dining room when there was a knock on the front door. “I’ll get it,” Kyle called to the rest of the family, seeing as he was right next to the door.  
When he opened the door, the last thing he expected to see was Cartman standing there. But that’s exactly who was on his front door step, looking incredibly awkward. Kyle stared back at him in shock and there was yet another moment of awkward silence.  
“Cartman?” Kyle finally asked. “What are you doing here?” Cartman blinked at him.  
“Wait a moment, this isn’t my house!” he said suddenly. “How did I end up here? Well, since I’m here, might as well join you for dinner.” And then he pushed past Kyle and made his way into his house. Incredibly confused, Kyle slowly shut the door and followed after him.  
“Um, mom, dad,” he said when they entered the dining room. “You remember, Cartman, right?” His parents looked over at him.  
“Yes, of course,” his mother said. “But what is he doing here?”  
“I got lost on my way home,” Cartman said in a slightly pathetic voice.  
“Er, is it all right if he stays for dinner?” Kyle added, still casting a confused glance at his sort of friend person (maybe). Sheila and Gerald exchanged glances before answering.  
“Sure, sweetie,” Sheila replied. “We don’t mind at all.” She turned to her husband. “Go get another set of silverware, won’t you?” As Kyle’s dad walked back into the kitchen, the others awkwardly made their way back over to the dining table and sat down. Ike came in a few moments later and sat down next to Cartman, happily and immediately poking him repeatedly in the face.  
Kyle flinched, waiting for Cartman’s usual freak out when something annoyed him, but it never came. Surprised, he glanced at him, only to find Cartman glaring angrily across the table, but biting his lower lip in frustration.  
The awkward silence lengthened (with the only one enjoying himself being Ike) until Kyle decided to actually make conversation with someone.  
“By the way, mom,” he said, suddenly remembering. “Apparently there’s going to be a Valentine’s day dance, and Cartman and I have to help plan for it and set it up.”  
“I do?” Cartman wondered, but he was drowned out by Kyle’s parents talking over him.  
“Well that’s wonderful, sweetie,” Sheila said. “I totally support it as long as I don’t find anything offensive going on with such a holiday.” Kyle heard a sharp intake of breath next to him but didn’t look over at Cartman. “So, when do you first meet?”  
“I don’t know,” Kyle admitted. “Our teacher just gave us the assignment and then didn’t go into any more detail. It was really annoyingly vague.”  
But Kyle’s parents were hardly listening anymore. His mother had started rambling about some sort of support group for rioters that she had funded, which was rioting about some sort of pointless thing that Cartman couldn’t stand.  
Thankfully, Sheila had her eyes closed as she was ranting, so she didn’t see Cartman slamming his head on the table. Ike and Kyle exchanged confused glances, before Ike continued to poke Cartman in the face.  
Sighing in frustration, Kyle stood up. “I’ll be right back,” he stated to no one in particular and got up from the table and left the room before anyone could stop him. He quickly ran up to his room and closed the door behind him.  
He rushed over to his phone and immediately dialed Stan’s number. He picked up after Kyle recalled twice.  
“Dude, I’m in the middle of dinner,” Stan chastised when he discovered who it was. “This had better be important.”  
“I’m freaking out, man!” Kyle told him in a hoarse whisper. “I’m totally freaking out!”  
“Dude, calm down,” Stan said, suddenly serious. “What’s going on?”  
“Cartman is in my house right now having dinner with my family!” he hissed. There was a long pause on the other end, and he couldn’t imagine how Stan was taking it.  
“What?” was his eventual reply. “What do you mean he’s in your house? Why?”  
“I don’t know,” Kyle said, closing his eyes. “He says that he got lost on his way home, and then he just invited him inside.”  
“And what terrible things has he been doing to you that’s gotten you so fired up about?” his friend asked him.  
“That’s the thing, Stan!” he replied. “He’s not doing ANYTHING!”  
“What are you talking about?” Stan asked after a moment. Kyle let out a hiss of annoyance.  
“My brother’s poking him in the face, my mom is rambling about riots and being underrepresented in the media or something, and my dad made us do a Jewish prayer and Cartman hasn’t made any attempt to rage at any of them!”  
“What has he been doing?” the boy on the other wondered.  
“NOTHING!” Kyle shouted, louder than he meant to. “I have no idea what the hell is going on with him! Why is he doing this to me?”  
“Did you try asking him?” Stan asked after a moment of mulling it over. Kyle’s eye twitched.  
“You and I are talking about the same Cartman, right?” he asked sarcastically. “You know he’s not going to tell me the truth! You know what he’s like!” Seriously, he asked, “What should I do?”  
“I don’t know, man,” Stan replied after a long silence. “I don’t know.” Kyle let out a sigh of defeat.  
“Look, they’re probably starting to worry about me down there,” he told him. “I’ve gotta go. I’ll talk to you tomorrow about it.”  
“Okay, fine,” Stan agreed. “Just try not to make him mad.” Kyle would have loved to point out that his family had been doing nothing but making Cartman mad, but Stan had already hung up. Sighing, he took several deep breaths and slowly made his way back downstairs.  
The rest of the evening continued to be passed awkwardly enough, with Kyle’s parents saying or doing something that Cartman disapproved of, while Cartman continued to bite his tongue about it. Finally, and with tons of mercy from the author, dinner was finally finished and Kyle thought he could finally breathe easy as Cartman made his way to the front door. But then he stopped and just stood there.  
“W-what’s wrong?” Kyle asked when Cartman made absolutely no sign that he was going to continue to move anytime soon. “Why are you just standing there?”  
“I still don’t remember where my house is,” Cartman explained apathetically. Kyle buried his face in his hands.  
“God damn it,” he muttered under his breath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that’s where I’m going to end it right there. Next time, we’ll hopefully see what this committee is all about and why the fuck Stan thinks Kyle cares about whether he likes the new girl or not. Also, I’m hoping to bring Dr. Pidd back into the story at some point so look forward (or not) to that. Thanks for reading, and don’t forget to smile! You are the face of Freddy Fazbear’s!


	4. Five Angry Children

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, it’s nine fifty at night and I have nothing better to do. Might as well start typing up the next chapter. Today, we’ll have all sorts of secrets revealed to us (and by us, I mean you, since I already know all of the secrets. Including yours.)
> 
> “Singing ‘Here’s to never growing up!’”

Kyle, for the life of him, would never be able to figure out how Cartman convinced him to let him stay the night at his house. But there the fat kid was, fast asleep on his floor, and he would never be able to figure out how he managed to do it. Something Cartman had said had given Kyle no other out other than letting him stay the night. He just didn’t remember what it was. And what seemed even stranger was the fact that his parents were more than happy to let him stay the night. He was pretty sure his parents didn’t like Cartman all that much, but for some reason they seemed to have forgotten that.  
More than once during the night, Kyle had thought of calling Stan and asking him what to do. But he held himself back for several reasons. He didn’t think Stan would appreciate being woken up in the middle of the night just for this. And he didn’t want Cartman to overhear him, even if he was fast asleep. He could just sneak down to the living room and use the phone there, but again, there was always the possibility of waking someone up.  
He tried to relax and force himself to sleep, but just couldn’t bring himself to do it. He wasn’t sure what Cartman was up to, but he knew him well enough that he couldn’t just be nice to him for the sake of being nice. Whenever Cartman was even sort of nice to him, there was always some sort of ulterior motive. But this seemed different somehow. It was like he was being nice to him for some other reason than his usual Cartman schemes. What if he was planning on killing him? It wasn’t unheard of! Cartman had certainly tried to kill him in the past, and they had just finished reading Edgar Allen Poe’s A Tell-Tale Heart. What if Cartman was planning on reenacting the story and was going to smother him in his sleep?!? Or give him a blind eye, and then reenact the story and smother him in his sleep?  
His heart was pounding in his chest, and he wouldn’t dare look over at the sleeping boy for fear that even acknowledging he was there would somehow bring disaster upon him.  
But Cartman was not asleep, unbeknownst to Kyle, as he too was having his own inner turmoil. What the fuck was wrong with him?!? Why on earth would he invite Kyle to the movies with him? He fucking hated that Jew!  
And he still couldn’t remember volunteering to be on the dance planning committee, no matter what Kyle said. Was he going insane? Why, oh why did he just invite himself over to Kyle’s house?  
An annoying voice came into his head that sounded remarkably like Dr. Pidd’s voice, telling him that he knew exactly why he had done all of those things. Angrily, Cartman slapped himself in the face and rolled over on his side. There was no way that he was in love with Kyle, no matter what all of the crazy shippers said! And he definitely didn’t agree with that crazy quack of a doctor. Why did she have to put these stupid ideas into his head in the first place?!? This was all her fault!  
Cartman sat up, as if realizing where he was for the first time. Why was he here? Why did Kyle have to let him in and let him stay over? He didn’t even make that good of an argument for staying as far as he remembered! Glancing over, he could vaguely make out Kyle’s sleeping shape from the bed. His back was turned to him, which for some reason disappointed him.  
Laying back down, he thought about calling someone, but he quickly pushed the idea out of his head. He couldn’t call Stan or Kenny, cuz otherwise they’d get the wrong idea. And it would be the same with his mother as well. And heaven forbid if he actually considered calling that stupid supposed “doctor.” Besides, he didn’t want to risk waking Kyle or the rest of his family up by sneaking downstairs.  
At some point, he heard Kyle’s breathing quicken, and that did little to reassure him. He still had no idea how he had gotten himself in this situation. And he was determined to prove to that doctor that he wasn’t doing any of this out of love. But he had no idea why else he would be making a fool of himself. Unless it really was…  
God damn it! Cartman angrily thought to himself. Stop trying to agree with that stupid doctor! I’m going to prove to everyone that there’s nothing going on between us! I hate his guts! There’s nothing else to it!

The next day, Stan and Kenny stood next to the bus stop. Both of them, for some reason, seemed utterly refreshed that morning. Stan, after dinner, had called up Angela and asked her on a date, and she had said yes. And he couldn’t deny it anymore, he had a huge crush on her. There was just something about her that made him feel light on his feet.  
Kenny, on the other hand, had gotten a full body, deep tissue massage from a homeless guy who lived behind the local KFC and had magic fingers the night before, so he was reenergized and ready to take on the day before him.  
They still couldn’t stand how long it was taking Kyle and Cartman to get there, though. And it wasn’t like the two of them could really talk about anything! What would they talk about? The weather?  
“Dude, the bus is going to be here any minute!” Stan pointed out, checking his watch impatiently. “Where the heck are they?” The two of them stood several feet apart, obviously used to standing with their friends between them, and neither of them willing to move any closer to each other.  
Kenny let out a shrug. “Maybe they both decided to stay home to get out of doing that dance planning committee thing,” he suggested. Stan glanced at him.  
“Didn’t Cartman want to do it though, for some strange reason?” he questioned.  
“Well then, I’ve got nothing,” Kenny responded.  
Stan opened his mouth to reply, but at that moment, both Kyle and Cartman arrived, both looking extremely sleep deprived, and both obviously looking like they were trying not to draw attention to the fact that they had arrived together. Stan and Kenny exchanged concerned glances as their two friends took up their places besides them.  
“Where have you two been?” Stan wondered. “You were almost late for school!”  
“And why do you look like you guys were hit by a truck?” Kenny added.  
“I couldn’t sleep at all last night,” Kyle mumbled, leaning on Stan.  
“Me neither,” Cartman growled between a huge yawn. Stan and Kenny exchanged another glance as the bus finally pulled up. Ms. Crabtree opened the door and glared down at the four boys.  
“Hurry up and get on,” she growled. Stan quickly climbed on board with Kyle slowly following behind him. The bus driver tapped her foot impatiently, but it took a long moment before Kenny struggled onto the bus, dragging Cartman, who had fallen fast asleep on him and was easily weighing him down. Kenny tried to struggle towards a seat, but Cartman’s weight was too much for him and he fell to the floor, getting crushed underneath his still sleeping friend. Instead of helping, Ms. Crabtree floored the gas pedal and continued driving.  
Stan and Kyle sat down in their usual seats, but before Stan could ask his friend how he managed not to sleep at all the night before, Angela made her way over to them.  
“May I sit with you guys?” she asked them. Stan said a shy “sure,” and Kyle just mumbled something incomprehensible, so she sat down with a smile. “I’m super excited about the dance, aren’t you guys?” Again, Stan gave her a “sure,” and Kyle let out a groan instead of replying. “I think the fair is going to be even better than the dance though,” she added.  
“Yeah, nothing’s nearly as awesome as rides and games and stuff,” Stan agreed. “So, about our um…date…”  
“Oh yes,” Angela agreed. “I was thinking Saturday night if that’s all right with you.”  
“That’s perfect,” he told her with a sigh, glad that he hadn’t just dreamed their conversation the night before. He was painfully aware that Kyle was giving him a confused look at the moment, but he ignored it.  
“Oh good,” the girl stated. “Since we have that dance planning committee every day this week, I thought it would be better if we had our date Saturday.”  
Kyle, who had been about to fall asleep, suddenly snapped wide awake and he glanced over at the new girl. “We have that stupid dance planning thing the entire week?” he asked. “Since when?”  
“Since yesterday, silly!” Angela giggled. “Mr. Garrison was saying how we were to stay after school every day until Valentine’s day! Don’t you remember?”  
Kyle wanted to point out to her that of course he didn’t remember, otherwise he wouldn’t have asked her that, but the thought of having to stay after school today of all days weighed much more heavily on his mind. Of course, their teacher would do that. Because, it wasn’t like his entire week was being ruined by this or anything. Just ruin a handful of students’ weeks instead!  
After school, Kyle, Wendy, Cartman, Butters and Angela were forced to say good bye to their friends and made their way to the gymnasium to plan the stupid dance, grumbling all the way. There was a table sitting in the middle of the gym waiting for them, and the five of them slowly made their way over to sit down.  
“Okay, I think the first order of business should be to come up with a super awesome secret name for our group!” Butters said immediately. Kyle, who had immediately slammed his face into the table to try and go back to sleep, raised his head just enough to glare at his friend.  
“Butters,” he growled. “Can we just instead pick a theme for this stupid dance so we can get out of here faster?”  
“Seriously, Butters,” Cartman agreed. “Don’t be lame.”  
Butters seemed completely unfazed by their hostility and instead just smiled and shrugged. “Okay,” he agreed. “So, what do you think our theme should be, Kyle?”  
“I don’t care,” Kyle mumbled, closing his eyes again.  
“Maybe we should go with an underwater theme,” Angela suggested.  
“Oh, how original,” Wendy growled under her breath. “Any other bright ideas?”  
“I still don’t remember signing up for this stupid committee,” Cartman decided to point out, but he was mostly ignored.  
“I don’t know, do we want to go with something that’s obvious, or something more out there?” Angela asked, ignoring Wendy’s hostility towards her. “It’s kind of weird that only five of us are working on this, don’t you think? You’d think that they would at least have a teacher help us out or something.”  
“Yeah, you’re probably right about that,” Butters agreed, still with a peaceful smile on his face. Wendy glared at the new girl.  
“What, so you don’t think the five of us can accomplish something like this on our own?” she growled at her. “Do you always need to have someone holding your hand? Is that it?”  
“She has a point about that,” Butters pointed out.  
“Does anyone know how long we have to be here?” Cartman wondered suddenly. “Because I’m getting bored.”  
“That’s a good question,” Butters replied.  
“I also can’t believe none of the other classes are helping out,” Angela continued. “I mean, is the dance just going to be us fourth graders, or are the other grades coming too? Because it would be nice to have some sort of help.”  
“Wow, three whole days and you just know everything about this school, don’t you?” Wendy grumbled, and Cartman couldn’t help but agree with her.  
“I agree,” Butters added.  
While Cartman yelled at Butters for constantly agreeing with everyone and to put a sock in it, Angela turned to Wendy, having gotten bored of complaining and instead wanting to gossip.  
“So, did you and Stan really date?” she asked the dark-haired girl. Wendy glared at her but said nothing. “It’s a shame it didn’t work out between you two. I think you two make a cute couple. I find it hard to find a boy I like, especially since my parents want me to marry within my religion. And I’m Jewish so…”  
“OH, COME ON!” Cartman screamed suddenly, overhearing her. Then, adding together a string of curses under his breath, he got up from the table and left the room, this time not returning at all. Angela stared in shock after him, but before she could ask what that was about, Butters suddenly spoke.  
“Okay, see you tomorrow, Cartman!” he called happily after his friend with a wave.  
“Was it something I said?” Angela asked, worriedly. Wendy rolled her eyes.  
“Well, obviously,” she growled. Angela, for some reason not hearing the venom in her voice, shrugged.  
“Anyways,” she said, a bit louder now. “I wanted to tell you that Stan asked me out the other day and I decided to say yes, and I was thinking…”  
“GOD DAMN IT!” Wendy snarled, also standing up, slamming her hands down on the table as she did so. She silently and angrily grabbed her backpack and stormed out of the room as well. Butters and Angela exchanged confused glances. Then Butters smiled and waved after the retreating girl.  
“Okay, see you tomorrow, Wendy!” he called. Angela blinked once then also stood up.  
“Well, I guess that should be enough for one day,” she decided. “I mean, two of us have already left, so there’s not much point to continuing, right? Right. I’ll see you tomorrow, you guys.” Then she gathered up her stuff and made her way out of the gym. Butters stared after her and sighed.  
“Well, I think that was a pretty productive first meeting,” he said, putting his hands on his hips. “Don’t you think so too, Kyle?” He got no reply. “Kyle?” he turned to look at him and it was only then that he realized that his friend had fallen asleep quite a while ago.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, might as well end it there. Next time, we’ll see how Wendy really feels about this news, and maybe turn to someone who she thinks will help. Also, we’ll see why Stan cares about what Kyle thinks of him dating Angela. And maybe we’ll also see Stan and Angela’s first date. But I doubt it.  
> Until next time! Don’t forget to read and review! Or I’ll kill you! Love!


	5. People start to lose it.  All of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, to be perfectly honest, I have no idea what’s going to happen in this chapter. I know I said things were going to happen, but I only have a vague idea of how to carry them out. So, we’ll see where this goes. Also, be aware (if you weren’t already) I have a softness for running jokes and fourth wall jokes (as long as they’re good), so keep that in mind, and remember, no refunds!
> 
> “Call up all your friends, go hard this weekend…”

Wendy angrily stormed into class the next day, not looking any of her classmates in the eye. She hadn’t gotten a whole lot of sleep the night before, due to worrying about Stan and Angela. She didn’t know what to do about them. And it didn’t help that when she called Bebe up to ask her what she should do to stop thinking about it, her friend offered absolutely no helpful ideas and instead just called Angela a “bitch-ass whore fuck” for twenty minutes.  
What made it worse was that Wendy had completely agreed with everything that Angela had complained about the night before, but she wasn’t allowed to agree with her out loud. What if Angela had thought that she actually liked her?  
Mr. Garrison drolled on and on about something or other, and she was annoyed to see Stan and Angela constantly whispering to each other and giggling. She couldn’t help but grit her teeth at the sight. Maybe she should talk to someone about it. Someone who wasn’t Bebe.  
When lunch time finally came around, she decided to go to the counselor’s office for advice. She was surprised when she entered the office and saw not Mr. Mackey, but a woman she had never met before. The woman looked up as Wendy entered and gave her a creepy smile.  
“Why, hello there, young lady,” she greeted Wendy. “What can I do for you?” Wendy blinked in surprise.  
“Where’s Mr. Mackey?” she wondered instead of answering.  
“Why, he took a year off,” the woman told her. “To find spiritual enlightenment. I’m Dr. Quinn Pidd, and I’ll be taking over for a while.”  
“Oh,” Wendy replied. “Well, I’m Wendy. I was sort of hoping you could help me with a problem I’m having.”  
“Well, come on in, and let’s talk about it,” Dr. Pidd offered, gesturing to an empty seat. “We’ll have a nice girl chat!” Once Wendy had taken a seat, she got out from behind her desk and sat down in a chair across from her. “Now, what can I help you with?”  
“Well, there’s a new girl in school,” Wendy replied after a moment of hesitation. “And she really likes my ex-boyfriend Stan, and he likes her. She told me that they’re going on a date on Saturday, and I don’t know what to do.”  
“Do you still like Stan?” Dr. Pidd asked, trying to look concerned but still keep the unsettling smile on her face.   
“Well of course I do!” Wendy answered immediately, throwing her hands in the air. “I wouldn’t be having a problem if I didn’t still like him! And it doesn’t help that’s totally rubbing in my face the fact that she and Stan are dating now!”  
“Now that is a problem,” the doctor said, though she didn’t look like she thought it was a problem. “Now I’ve had several cases like this, and the one thing you can do is to fight for your love! Make him realize how much you mean to him! Tear her heart out in a grand gesture!”  
Wendy blinked in surprise at her. Most therapists recommended moving on with your life or finding a new love. Something like that. This one was seemingly suggesting the exact opposite of that!  
“Are you suggesting that I try to kill the new girl just because the guy I like seems to like her more than me?” Wendy clarified, still blinking in confusion.  
“No! Of course not!” Dr. Pidd replied, winking at her and still smiling. Wendy stared blankly back. “I’m just speaking metaphorically, of course,” she stated, still winking. “You just need to show them both that you take love seriously! That you don’t mess around!”  
Wendy thought about it for a long moment. “I think I know what you’re saying,” she said at last. Dr. Pidd’s smile somehow managed to widen.  
“Oh good,” she replied. “I’m so glad I was able to help!”  
“Uh, yeah, sure,” Wendy agreed quickly, hastily getting out of her seat. “Well, thanks, but I have to get lunch before the bell rings.” And she left without another word.  
She stepped out into the hall and breathed in a sigh of relief. Man, that chick was scary! Wendy hadn’t realized that someone could look that creepy while smiling, but managing to show all of your teeth certainly didn’t help. And Wendy liked to think she was too smart to believe what Dr. Pidd had told her. Maybe it had been a bad idea to see her.  
She went into the lunch room and saw Stan sitting with his friends. She took a step towards them, a thought coming into her head. But then she changed her mind and turned to join her friends. But before she could move, however, she saw a sight that horrified her. Angela was sitting with all of her friends. And they were laughing. Without her.

Stan felt like he should feel guilty about dating the new girl. He didn’t want to make Wendy or anyone else jealous, but he couldn’t help it. Angela just seemed perfect somehow. And for some reason, he couldn’t talk to his friends about it because he had a feeling that they just wouldn’t care. But honestly, what was there to care about? He was dating a new girl! He was moving on with his life. What more could there be?  
He was interrupted out of his thoughts by a tray angrily slamming down onto the table next to him and he was surprised to see Wendy sitting down. His friends were equally as surprised.  
“Hey Wendy,” Stan greeted nervously, trying to sound friendly. “What are you doing here? Why aren’t you eating with your friends?”  
“Oh, you know,” Wendy replied, forcing a smile and turning towards him. “I thought, you know, just because we aren’t dating anymore, we can’t still be friends, right? We can still be friendly, you know.” She turned to the other three. “So, what were you guys talking about?”  
Cartman, Kyle and Kenny exchanged glances. They had been asking Stan about where he was going to take Angela for their date before he just randomly zoned out, but none of them were very eager to tell her that.  
“Um, we were just talking about how we were thinking of going to the carnival but not the dance,” Kenny blurted out. “I mean, who has ever found a dance fun, am I right?”  
“Yeah,” Wendy agreed reluctantly, immediately seeing through Kenny’s bullshit lie but deciding to go with it anyways. “Personally, I think we should just have the carnival, you know? It’s way less awkward than asking someone to go to a dance or something.”  
Cartman choked slightly. “We don’t…actually have to ask someone… do we?” he asked awkwardly. The others turned to stare at him.  
“What?” Stan asked, wanting him to clarify. Cartman stared back at him.  
“Darn it,” he said suddenly, standing up. “Man, I just remembered, this not nearly enough food! I’m still so starving! I’m just going to go see if there’s anything left.” And he quickly stood and walked away to the other side of the room before any of his friends could reply.  
“Is there a reason Cartman’s been acting so strange?” Wendy decided to ask.  
“You picked today to ask that question?” Kyle replied.

Cartman couldn’t believe he was doing this. He had been doing some pretty degrading stuff lately, but this seemed to be going too far. He tried to tell his feet that, but they just wouldn’t listen to him.  
After the stupid dance planning meeting committee (in which they still hadn’t really agreed on a theme because Butters just kept suggesting things and all of them were stupid), Cartman had immediately left and went wandering through the school until he had found the psychiatrist’s office. He stood outside of the door, annoyed to see that Dr. Pidd was still in her office (or at least he assumed, the lights were on). He had a silent argument with himself, trying to convince himself to just turn around, go home, and wait until Monday. But something made him knock on the door.  
Please be gone! Please be gone! Please be gone! Cartman thought frantically to himself. But then he heard the annoying, condescending voice from beyond the door.  
“Come in!” Dr. Pidd called.  
“Damn it,” Cartman muttered angrily, entering the room. Dr. Pidd looked up as she quickly shoved some papers into her desk.  
“Ah, Eric!” she greeted. “I wasn’t expecting you until Monday! What can I do for you?”  
Cartman stared at her. That was a good question. What was he doing here? If he thought she was right about you-know-what, then he would be here asking for advice. But obviously she wasn’t right. She couldn’t be right!  
“Um,” he replied, thinking for a long moment.  
“Don’t worry, I know what this is all about,” Dr. Pidd told him, in a voice like she was trying to teach a dog how to sit.  
“Er, you do?” he asked, nervously. Did she finally understand what she was putting him through? Was she about to admit that she was wrong?  
“Yes,” she replied. “I know you’re deeply in love with your friend Kyle and you don’t know what to do.” Before he could object, she continued. “I blame myself, really. I think I put too much pressure on you. But you don’t have to worry, I’m here for you. I know what you’re going through and I know how to help. You just have to tell him how you feel!”  
“I do tell him how I feel,” Cartman growled, quickly growing angry. “I tell him pretty much every day that I hate him!”  
She sighed in a way that sounded like she wanted to be mad at the cute little puppy that had just peed on the floor, but couldn’t bring herself to do it. And it was really getting on Cartman’s nerves.  
“You just don’t get it, young Eric,” she told him.  
“No, you don’t get it!” Cartman snapped before she could continue. “I’m not in love with Kyle! I never have been, and I never will be! And I’ll prove to you if it’s the last thing I do!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And because I really have no idea what else to add, I’m just going to end it right here. It’s as good a place as any. Please tell me what you think so far and how I could improve. Because if you don’t tell me, I don’t know. Anyways, I hope you’re enjoying yourself. I know I am. Also, I’m not quite sure what Stan and Angela should do for their first date, so if you have any suggestions, please mention it in your review or message me or something. And remember to smile! You’re the face of Freddy Fazbear’s!


	6. The Dating Episode

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so we’re actually going to move forward with the plot now. I don’t know how funny this chapter will be, but we’ll see how it goes. I’ve decided how long this fan fiction is going to be approximately, but thankfully I have a lot of shit that needs to happen, so let’s get this done, yo! It’s not like I have work or something! (I have school)
> 
> “For no damn reason, I don’t think we’ll ever change…”

Stan sat in his room, pacing back and forth. He hadn’t admitted it to any of his friends, but he was nervous about his date with Angela. He hadn’t gone on a first date in such a long time. And he had never really dated anyone except Wendy. He wasn’t really sure what to do on a first date. Or any date with anyone that wasn’t Wendy.  
He stared at his phone for a long time before finally deciding to call someone. But he couldn’t call Kyle or Cartman. Neither of them had really dated enough girls to be much help in this situation. So, he decided to call Kenny. His friend picked up on the second to last ring.  
“What?” Kenny said by way of greeting.  
“Kenny, it’s Stan,” he told him. “I was kind of hoping you could give me some advice.”  
“Never fall asleep while making waffles,” Kenny advised after thinking it over for a moment. Stan sighed with slight annoyance.  
“I mean dating advice,” he corrected.  
“Oh!” Kenny replied. “Why do you need that?”  
“Because you’ve been on hundreds of dates and I’ve only been with Wendy,” Stan told him. “And I need help.”  
“Just be yourself, man,” his friend told him. “Talk about things you like. And by Jesus, if she goes in to kiss you, don’t throw up on her.” Stan frowned.  
“I don’t throw up anymore,” he muttered. He was glad that he couldn’t see Kenny, because he was sure that his friend was pulling a “yeah right” kind of face at the moment. “But what if I have nothing to say to her?”  
“Oh please,” Kenny scoffed. “If you’re smart, you’ll let her do all of the talking. The girls I know barely ever want to hear about you until they’re thoroughly done talking about themselves.”  
“And if she asks to know more about me?” Stan wondered.  
“It’s not brain science, you know,” Kenny pointed out. “Just tell her about yourself. Just try not to mention too much the crazy crap we get into every other week.”  
“I don’t know, Kenny,” Stan sighed. “I think I would just feel better if there was just someone there with me…”

“Ok, so here’s the plan,” Cartman said, looking Stan clear in the face. “I’m going to go with you with my own date.” Stan blinked in confusion at him. “We’ll do a sort of double date. That way, we can tell you what to do, and it won’t look suspicious and she won’t have to smack you if she finds out about it. Besides, you’ll be much less stressed if you go out with another couple, you know.”  
“And why are you so eager to help?” Stan wondered. Cartman rolled his eyes.  
“You know, believe it or not I do consider you a friend,” he told him. “And that means I want to help you simply for the sake of helping you.” Stan considered this for a moment.  
“Yeah, I guess that’s true,” he agreed. “But are you sure this will work? What if you don’t get a date by Saturday?”  
“Oh please,” Cartman scoffed. “I have my ways, Marsh. You’ll have nothing to worry about.”  
After school was over, Cartman, Kyle and Kenny made their way to the gymnasium (Kenny was following because he had nothing better to do). Cartman tried to explain the plan without using the words “double” or “date.”  
“So, I told Stan that we’d follow him on his date and make sure he doesn’t totally screw it up,” he told Kyle, not even realizing Kenny was following them. Kyle blinked at him.  
“Why?” he wondered. “Won’t she think it’s weird that his friends are just following them around? Or are we supposed to just hide and spy on them?”  
“Not unless we have a totally legitimate reason for being there,” Cartman replied.  
“Like what?” Kyle asked, but Cartman refused to say anything more.

Stan glanced at his watch, then down the road. Cartman was late. They were supposed to meet up with Angela at the park five minutes ago. Where was he? Then he saw him coming up the path and was confused to see him fuming silently to himself with Kyle and Kenny trailing after him.   
“We’re here!” Kenny greeted happily. Stan tried to smile, but couldn’t bring himself to do it. Instead he looked at Cartman.  
“Yeah, that’s great,” he muttered before adding, “Hey Cartman, can I talk to you for a second?” Leaving their two friends, they walked forward a bit until they were out of earshot. “I thought you said you were going to bring a date!” he hissed at him. Cartman blinked slowly at him.  
“Yeah…” he said carefully.  
“So, you know, it would be a totally not weird double date?” Stan clarified, reminding him.  
“Yeah…”  
“You brought Kyle and Kenny!” Stan growled through gritted teeth. Cartman sighed.  
“Yeah…” he replied, utterly defeated. Stan rolled his eyes, also utterly defeated.  
“You know, I don’t really think that…” he started to say, but before he could finish, they were interrupted by someone calling his name and the arrival of Angela.  
“There you are!” she greeted. “I thought you were going to meet me in the park!” Then she noticed Cartman, looked past both of them and noticed Kenny and Kyle. Instead of looking suspicious, she just laughed. “Oh Stan,” she giggled. “I knew you were nervous and you wanted to double date, but I didn’t think that meant bringing all of your friends!”  
Stan tried to apologize and explain himself while Kyle glared at Cartman, muttering “It was supposed to be a what?” But before he could start to, Angela just laughed again.  
“That’s quite all right,” she said. “The more the merrier, I always say! Well come on!” Then she took Stan by the arm and led the way back down the street, leaving the other three to follow after them.  
The park was nearly empty when they arrived, despite it being around noon, but then again, it was February, and it was kind of cold out. There was a bush next to the path almost every five feet, and the gaps between each bush was filled by another bench. There were a couple of snack booths scattered around the park for some reason, staffed with bored looking people.  
Angela, for some reason, looked absolutely over joyed to be there. It was like she had never seen a park before, because she kept looking all over the place at the “majesty” of it all.   
Stan had a hard time trying to feel romantic when all of his friends were following them around muttering to themselves. He wished they would stop muttering long enough to notice his “fuck off” face. Angela didn’t seem to mind, though. He wished she would be at least a little annoyed so he could make his friends leave.  
“So, do you come here to the park often?” Angela asked, turning to the boys.  
“Fuck no,” Cartman told her before Stan could reply, prompting Kyle and Kenny to nudge him hard in the ribs. Stan glared at him before turning back to Angela.  
“Are you hungry?” he asked her. “We could get something from that stand if you want.”  
“That would be nice,” Angela replied with a smile.  
“Yeah, I could eat,” Cartman added. He started to follow them, but Kyle let out a sigh and grabbed Cartman’s hand, dragging him away.  
“No, we’re going to sit on this bench over here and let them enjoy their date,” he growled as Kenny followed them. He was surprised when Cartman put up absolutely no resistance to being dragged away (he at least would have expected a tiny “Don’t tell me what to do”). Instead, Cartman just stared vaguely at the ground in front of him in shock as Kyle and Kenny led him over to one of the benches.  
Stan and Angela returned two minutes later and sat down on the bench next to them, a hot pretzel in both of their hands. Kenny glanced over at them.  
“You could have at least asked us if we wanted anything,” he muttered under his breath. Stan rolled his eyes and turned back to Angela.  
“So, how are you liking South Park?” he asked her nervously. She smiled.  
“It’s been nice,” she replied. “I really like it here. All of the people here have been so nice to me!” In a lower voice so the others wouldn’t hear, she added. “I’m especially crushing on a certain someone!” Stan felt his heart skip a beat.  
“R-r-really?” he asked. She nodded with a wink and a finger to her mouth. Before she could say more, however, she let out a sharp “Ow!” and grabbed the back of her neck. “What’s wrong?” Stan wondered.  
“I think something just hit me in the back of the neck!” Angela said. She pulled her hand back in front of her to reveal a frozen pea. “Who shot a frozen pea at me?”  
“Maybe we should go somewhere else,” Stan told her. “Obviously someone’s playing some sort of prank.”  
“If you say so,” Angela replied reluctantly. She quickly walked over to the other bench and shook the other three (who had fallen asleep from their boring conversation) awake. “Come on, you guys, we’re going to go for a walk in the park!”  
Stan tried not to groan. She could have just left them there and they could have come back for his friends at the end. His friends mumbled something as they rose and began following them, thankfully a few feet away to give the two some privacy.  
“I’m really getting the feeling that we shouldn’t be here,” Kyle muttered to the other two. “This really feels like a mistake. Maybe we should just go.”  
“Oh, come on,” Cartman said in a low voice. “Stan is on his first date with a girl that isn’t Wendy and he wanted us to support him and make sure he didn’t do anything stupid. Besides, Angela doesn’t seem to mind.”  
“Stan looks kind of pissed off though,” Kenny pointed out.  
“Well yeah,” Kyle agreed, glaring at Cartman. “I don’t know why you told Stan you were going to bring a date and then invited the two of us instead.”  
Cartman growled in response but didn’t say anything to defend himself. He muttered something under his breath that the other two couldn’t make out and refused to look at either of them.  
Angela glanced back at them, then reached out and took Stan’s hand in hers as they walked. Immediately, she was shot in the back of the neck again. She muttered another “Ouch!” and rubbed the back of her neck angrily. She tried to take his hand again, but the same exact thing happened to her.  
“You know, if you weren’t standing right next to me, I would have thought that you were shooting her in the back of the neck, Cartman,” Kyle pointed out. The other boy opened his mouth as if he were about to start arguing with him, but then thought better about it and closed his mouth again with a huff.  
They continued walking through the park when suddenly they heard the strum of a guitar being played, and they all turned to see a fancy Mexican guitar player a couple feet away playing incredibly cheesy and romantic music. Angela smiled and said “How romantic!” while Stan blushed and the other three just rolled their eyes. It quickly became apparent that the guitar player was following them, as the music never softened the further they got away from where they had initially seen him.  
After about ten minutes of walking around the park, chatting and taking in the sights while the guitar player continued to follow them out of sight, they came to rest at another pair of benches. At this point, Cartman stared at the ground and calmly picked up a rock about fist-sized. Then he turned and angrily chucked it through some bushes. The guitar music abruptly cut off and there was an audible thud. Cartman, with satisfaction, sat down next to Kyle and Kenny.  
“That was driving me crazy,” he muttered to Kyle and Kenny’s stunned faces.  
“So, where do you want to go next?” Angela asked Stan, sitting on a different bench next to him. Stan hesitated and glanced nervously at his friends. Kenny rolled his eyes and made a gesture at him to go on. Stan continued to stare blankly at him and Kenny sighed. He pointed up at the sun which had begun to set and then pointed out of the park. He brought a fist to his mouth repeatedly, pretending to eat. It took a long moment before realization finally dawned on Stan.  
“Oh! Dinner!” he blurted out before turning to Angela. “How about we get dinner?”  
“I would like that very much,” she replied before getting shot again. “Okay, seriously,” she said, looking around. “Where is that coming from?” But there wasn’t a single thing they saw that could hint to where a prankster might be hiding.  
“Come on, let’s get out of here,” Stan suggested. He took her hand to lead her away, but then he too felt a sharp pain in his neck. He slapped his hand over it and looked around. Still, there was nothing. And he didn’t want to ruin their date by trying to look for this attacker. Maybe whoever was shooting peas at them wouldn’t follow them back into town.

Stan knew he shouldn’t be upset. His friends were only trying to help. And he had asked them for their help, and it wasn’t like Angela minded or anything. But when they had gotten to the fancy restaurant, couldn’t his friends have maybe not sat down at the same table as Angela and him? Or maybe even attempt to just find a separate table and given the two of them some privacy? But no, when they were shown to this nice round, table-clothed table, they just had to sit down with them.  
He tried not to glare as they got situated and Cartman immediately started eating all of the bread in the basket the waiter had brought them. The waiter (in an obvious attempt to get them out of there faster) immediately came up and took their order. When he brought more bread out, Kenny and Cartman begun an intense stare down as they silently fought over the bread.  
Stan, deciding to finally take Kenny’s advice, began telling Angela about his life and what he liked to do for fun. She listened with a smile on her face, adding in her own likes and dislikes as well. Kyle, who was sitting next to her, sat there staring at the table looking incredibly bored until Stan noticed at one point that he suddenly flinched and shifted his seat closer to Cartman, who was sitting next to him.  
“Yeah, I’ve always loved animals,” Angela said as Kyle flinched again and shifted further from her. “I love zoos and all, but I always thought it was kind of mean keeping them in cages like that and letting people gawk at them.”  
“I know, right?” Stan agreed, even though he really didn’t. “It’s pretty messed up, if you ask me.”  
“But I thought you…” Kyle started to say before cutting himself off with a strange noise and scooting further to the other side of the table.  
Stan was about to question him about this, but was interrupted by the arrival of their food, and then any other thought was driven from his mind. Before he could shoot a look to his friends to tell them not to embarrass him, he noticed that Kenny had already planted his face squarely in his meal. And Cartman was not doing much better in the way of manners. Thankfully, Angela seemed to have completely forgotten that his friends existed and only had eyes for him.  
Stan and Kyle both ate slowly and everyone was pretty silent as they ate, only exchanging a word or two. Then, suddenly, Kyle let out a gasp and he jumped, accidently flinging his fork, which whacked Kenny in the head. He lifted it to reveal a completely clean plate and face as he glared at Kyle.  
“Ow!” he said.  
“Sorry, dude,” Kyle muttered. “I have no idea where that came from.” Though only Kenny noticed him cast a quick sideways glare at Angela and scooch further away from her. Kenny glanced at Angela, who ate calmly and hadn’t seem to notice any of it.  
A few minutes later, the waiter returned asking them if they wanted dessert (to which Kenny and Angela said “yes” before Stan could stop them). He then began collecting their plates and it was only then that Stan noticed with surprise that Cartman hadn’t finished his food. In fact, it was still half filled. He looked at Cartman who was looking quite nervous and didn’t even object to the waiter taking away his plate.  
Stan pushed this concern away, however and resumed chatting with Angela. They were still talking about their hobbies (now with Kenny looking extremely bored) when dessert arrived. They were interrupted, however, when Cartman suddenly gave a loud “yelp!” and he and Kyle fell from their chairs and crashed to the floor.  
“What the heck was that about?” Stan asked, standing and looking down at them.  
“Oh, you know,” Kyle muttered, sitting up and rubbing his head. “Just neglecting not to fall out of my chair and such.”  
“Kenny better not be snickering,” Cartman mumbled, having landed on his face. Kenny (who had indeed been silently laughing) immediately tried to contain himself. Angela stared down at the two of them before turning to Stan and smiling.  
“They seem nice,” she noted, and all Stan could do was stare in confusion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that’s where I’m going to end this chapter. Next time, we’ll find out who was shooting peas at them (as if you didn’t already know), and what was up with the restaurant scene. Oh, trust me, there’s more going on here than meets the eye! Remember to read and review, because if I don’t know how well I’m doing, I can’t improve, now, can I? Also, don’t forget, that kid kicked sand in Cool Cat’s face.


	7. The chapter where the stuff from the previous chapter gets explained, some new stuff happens, and Cartman is forced to see Dr. Pidd again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, once again, I have no idea about much of what’s going to happen this chapter, but I am going to explain a few things. And bust open some more romance clichés while I’m at it, because darn it, there are so many that I just hate and I’m sticking it to them! Try and figure out which ones they are.
> 
> “Meet you at the spot! Half past ten o clock!”

Kenny, Kyle and Cartman slowly made their way down the street, trying to get home before it got too dark out. Stan had offered to walk Angela home, and Cartman had started to go with them before getting dragged away by his other two friends. As they walked on, Cartman muttered angrily to himself under his breath, Kyle glared down at the side walk, rubbing his sore arm, and Kenny walked nonchalantly, just glad to be over with the day.  
“Hey guys,” Kyle said suddenly before they made it all the way to Kenny’s house. “I need to tell you something that’s bugging me.” The other two paused.  
“Are you going to explain why you were spazzing out at the restaurant like that?” Kenny wondered, looking hopeful. Kyle glared at him.  
“I was not ‘spazzing out,’” he growled at him. “That Angela wouldn’t stop pinching me in the arm under the table!” Both Kenny and Cartman blinked in surprise.  
“Are you sure?” Kenny asked reluctantly.  
“Either that or Stan was somehow reaching past her and doing it,” Kyle replied.  
“No, I mean, are you sure you weren’t spazzing out?” Kenny clarified. “Because it looked like you were spazzing out.” Kyle’s only response was to narrow his eyes at him, which immediately shut him up. Rubbing his own arm and looking away awkwardly, he mumbled, “Okay, so why do you think she was doing that?”  
“How should I know?” Kyle replied with a long sigh. “I think we might just have to go with the obvious answer.”  
“That she thought she was pinching Stan and not you?” Cartman suggested, interrupting. His friends didn’t reply, but only gave him a look that said “Really?”  
“If she has a crush on you, then why didn’t she just ask you out or not go out with Stan?” Kenny wondered, deciding to ignore Cartman. Kyle shook his head in confusion.  
“I have no idea, dude,” he sighed. “We haven’t really talked all that much. Maybe she was just doing it to mess with me or something.”  
“Why?” Cartman wondered.  
“How the fuck should I know?” Kyle growled, throwing his hands in the air.  
“Maybe, now just hear me out on this one,” Cartman started. “Maybe, she’s a spy! From the future! Bent on taking over the world!”  
Kyle and Kenny exchanged glances, then started back at Cartman. Finally, Kenny let out a sigh of annoyance.  
“Cartman, stop talking,” he ordered.

Wendy sat on her bed with a sigh, a stick of bamboo and a bag of previously frozen peas lying on the floor. She couldn’t believe that she had done that. How could she just follow Stan around on his date without a moment of hesitation? And shooting them with peas? What was she thinking? She knew she should have just left when she saw that his three friends had joined them for some reason. Why had she continued to follow them? She felt terrible just thinking about it.  
But she just had to know. She just had to see exactly how much Stan was attached to the new girl. And how much that girl liked Stan. But she still felt like she couldn’t handle the truth, and she was right. They had been absolutely in love with each other, from what she saw. It had been far too much for her to bear.  
She heaved a long sigh and flopped onto her bed. Now she was going to have to go to school and see them all adoring each other. She wasn’t sure if she could take that. Maybe she should call in sick again? No, her parents would never let her do that.  
How could Angela say that Wendy and Stan made a cute couple and then just go out with him like that? Did Angela have a secret vendetta against her? Had she done something to offend her or something? Why was she doing this to her? What could she do to make Stan understand that she still wanted him?  
Then an idea came to her mind and she sat up. It was an evil, horrible idea, but it might just work! Then she shook her head. No! She could never do something like that! She had crossed the line by stalking her ex-boyfriend on his date. She wouldn’t go deeper into that sort of resentment and revenge.  
But then again, she had already crossed the line. What was there more to lose? And she did want Stan back, but at what price? What if this was just that one step too far? Would he never speak to her again, or even look at her? A part of her, a small tiny part of her, told her that she had to at least try.  
Sighing, she got up and shuffled over to her phone. The rest of her brain kept trying to tell her to stop, but the (possibly evil) side of her replied that there was nothing wrong in just asking about it. So, there was nothing to stop her from dialing the number (except the fact that she couldn’t remember his number, but that was more of a delay than a hindrance).  
He picked up after the fourth ring. “Hello?” she could hear him say.  
“Kyle,” Wendy greeted hesitantly. “It’s Wendy. I have something I want to ask you.”

Cartman sat in his own room, trying to ignore his growling stomach. He wished he had eaten more at the restaurant, because now lay on his bed, starving and feeling too lazy to get up and move into the kitchen. He knew he could and should have eaten everything on his plate, and he knew what had kept him from gobbling up everything in sight, but he didn’t want to admit it. Especially to himself.  
The moment he had felt Kyle press nervously against his side, he had just frozen. He could barely move or do anything except stare in shock. Just, his brain had pretty much shut down and he could think of nothing else. But there had to be some reason why that happened.  
He had never gotten annoyed with Kyle touching him before or anything. Or anyone else, for that matter. So, why had he frozen up like that? Why?  
You know the answer! The annoying voice that was beginning to sound more and more like Dr. Pidd’s voice sang in his head. Annoyed, Cartman slapped himself in the face to try to shake it loose. It didn’t work. And now his face hurt. Great.  
He sighed and thought about all the events that had transpired over the past few days. As much as he wanted to put all of blame on that dumb ass therapist, he couldn’t help but feel like it wasn’t entirely her fault. Had she not said anything, would he have acted the way he did once he had left that office? Why was it so suddenly important that he proved her stupid theory wrong? It’s not like he ever had a problem before.  
“It’s because I’m in love with…” Cartman started to say out loud before slapping both hands over his mouth to stop himself from finishing his own sentence. No! He was never going to admit it! “God damn it,” he muttered under his breath.  
He had to admit defeat. He wasn’t going to come up with a reasonable explanation for all of his strange actions this past week. He was just going to face the facts so he could move on to trying to cure himself. There was no more avoiding it, he admitted to himself. He was in love with Kyle.

Monday brought a large number of problems for the kids, and looking back, some of them had no idea how they managed to not notice the tension that was slowly but steadily rising. First, there was the obvious one of Wendy hating the new girl’s guts. But she also kept frowning at Stan, and she and Kyle seemed angry at each other for some reason. Cartman wouldn’t look any of his friends in the eye, and Kyle made a point to avoid Angela. The only one who seemed immune to the tension was Stan.  
A lot of the background characters noticed the tension as well, and it made it very hard to concentrate on anything the teacher was saying. It seemed to take forever for the bell to finally ring for lunch, but it was like a call from heaven when it finally did.  
The four boys ate silently until Angela came over and without even asking if she could join them, just squeezed her way in between Stan and Kyle. Kyle narrowed his eyes at her and scooched far away from her.  
Kenny and Cartman exchanged glances, then stared at Stan, but he made no reaction other than to shyly greet Angela. There was another long awkward pause as they sat there. Fortunately, they were all spared from having to say anything by the arrival of Craig and his gang who sat down around them, also without asking if they could join them.  
“Can you believe they’re actually going to have karaoke at this stupid dance?” Craig asked without even sort of greeting them first.  
“I just hope we’re not forced to go,” Clyde said, sitting down next to Kyle and shoving him right back next to Angela (even though at that point there had been enough space between the two that he could have sat down on the other side). “Or forced to sing. Or forced to bring dates. Or forced to…”  
“Clyde, stop talking,” Cartman growled at him. “You know the moment someone says stupid shit like that, they’re actually going to make it a thing.”  
“Oh, come on,” Craig said, violently stabbing his food with his fork. “I doubt that’s…” But before he could complete that sentence, Kenny (who was sitting next to him) cupped a hand over his mouth, muffling him out.   
They continued to eat (or in Craig and Kyle’s cases, just continue to violently stab their food), exchanging a few remarks with each other. Cartman noticed with annoyance that Kyle was shivering and trying to push away from Angela, but Clyde seemed to be infuriatingly immovable. Suddenly, and without any warning, Kyle jumped out of his seat somewhat violently.  
“Ok, I just remembered I have something else I need to do,” he hissed, taking a step back. “I’ll see you guys later.” Then he quickly turned and made his way out of the cafeteria. The others stared after him in shock.  
“What was up with him?” Stan wondered.  
“Yeah, you’d think that if he was just going to up and leave like that he’d at least come up with a better excuse,” Token said, shaking his head.

Cartman thought about just ditching his session with Dr. Pidd once class got out. He desperately wanted to. He didn’t want to go and have to admit to the doctor that she was right. But he had a feeling that she knew where he lived and would track him down no matter what. Maybe, just maybe, she could tell him how to cure himself of this.  
So, when the final bell tolled for the end of school, he quickly told Kyle that he couldn’t join them for the stupid committee and left him to walk there with Wendy instead. He was dreading having to walk through that door and have to let the doctor know she had won, and he stood outside her office for a long moment before finally going inside.  
“Oh, Eric, there you are!” Dr. Pidd said in a tone of voice like she had just found the dog who refused to take a bath. “I was starting to worry you know!” Cartman rolled his eyes and sat down on the couch.  
“I need help, Doc,” he said, cutting straight to the point. “I’m not well. I need you to cure me.” The doctor tried to blink in shock, but that was hard to do when her only expression was set to “creepy smile.”  
“Cure you of what?” she wondered. Cartman growled. She was just going to force him to admit it out loud, wasn’t she?  
“Of love, ok?” he snapped at her. “Alright? I admit defeat! You win! I’m in love with Kyle! There, I said it! Are you happy now? Now will you please cure me already?”  
The laugh she gave to this speech was akin to watching a baby stick something up its nose and pulling a funny face. It was really, really starting to get on his nerves.  
“Oh, you silly Billy!” she laughed. “I told you before! There’s nothing wrong with you! Being in love isn’t an illness! It’s beautiful! You should be proud and thankful! Declare your love to the world, and show everyone that you mean it!” Cartman blinked at her.  
“Yeah, I don’t think so,” he replied. “No one can ever know about this. Kyle and I are enemies. If this ever got out, my reputation would be ruined. Besides, I can’t be in love with him! The universe wouldn’t accept it!”  
“Well, the way I see it, there’s three options for you if you really don’t want anyone to know,” Dr. Pidd said after a moment of thought. “Option one is to kill Kyle.”  
“What? I can’t do that!” Cartman growled. “I mean, I could in the past, but doing that now would be unthinkable!”  
“Well, option two is to kill yourself,” she told him, never losing the creepy smile.  
“Yeah, I’m not doing that either,” he said when he realized she might be serious about it.  
“Well then, the final option is to make sure that no one ever finds out about your love for your friend,” she replied. Cartman let out a sigh of relief.  
“Thank you, yes!” he said, nodding. “That’s the option I want. How am I going to do that? What should I do?” There was a brief pause, and then…  
“KILL EVERYONE IN THE ENTIRE WORLD!” Dr. Pidd proclaimed. Then she started laughing crazily while thunder flashed behind her for some reason. Cartman immediately got up and headed to the door.  
“Ok, I think we’re done here,” he muttered, and he quickly closed the door behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m going to end it right there. I just wanted to give you a glimpse at how insane Dr. Pidd is, and set a tone for the rest of the story. As much as I would like to steal all the credit for that final scene, I actually pulled that joke from the first episode of the second season of an old British show called “Blackadder.” I love that show.  
> Anyways, next time we’ll see why Kyle and Wendy are mad at each other, have Stan start to suspect something’s up, put Kenny more in the plot, and do some other shit. Don’t forget to leave a review, because if I don’t know how I’m doing, I can’t improve. And just remember these wise, sagely words: “Taco cat spelled backwards is Taco cat.”


	8. Putting a Flashlight under your face and laughing evily

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today’s Chapter has been brought to you by the censorship program. Censorship Program. Because someone has to take out all of the best parts from everything you love.
> 
> “We don’t ever stop and we’re never gonna change…”

Kyle and Wendy walked awkwardly down the hall, not looking at or speaking to each other. They were both still seething at each other from their conversation from the night before, but neither of them wanted to talk about it.  
Unfortunately, when they arrived at the gymnasium, they found that they were the first ones there and with a sigh of annoyance they sat down on opposite sides of the table. It only took a good thirty seconds before Wendy decided that the silence was too awkward and decided to try to talk to the only person in the room.  
“Kyle…” she started to say but was interrupted.  
“I’m not going to do it,” he said, looking up at her. “I know what you’re going to say. I’m not going to pretend to go out with you just to try to make Stan jealous.” Wendy frowned at him in annoyance.  
“Well, why not?” she growled.  
“I told you last night,” Kyle replied, rolling his eyes. “One, because he’s my best friend. Two, because he’s actually happy with his new girlfriend. And three, because I promised him a while ago that I would never date his ex-girlfriend.”  
“It’s not fair,” Wendy pouted. “She’s not even that good looking. And they’ve only known each other for a week! Why aren’t I allowed to move on like he has?”  
“You’re not trying to move on,” Kyle pointed out. “You’re trying to make your ex-boyfriend jealous simply because you’re jealous of his new girlfriend. You have to move past this, you know.” Wendy sighed.  
“I know,” she mumbled. Kyle hesitated a moment before adding something else.  
“And for what it’s worth, I hate Angela just as much as you do,” he told her. Wendy blinked in surprise at him and was about to ask him what he meant, but at that moment, they were joined by Butters and Angela, who had both finally decided to show up.  
“What took you guys so long?” Wendy asked, glaring at Angela.  
“Where’s Eric?” Angela asked instead of answering, looking around as if he might just magically appear.  
“Therapy,” Kyle answered simply. “Can we just get this over with?”  
“Ok!” Butters said, pulling out a piece of paper that he was using to keep track of all the meetings. “So, apparently we’re supposed to come up with an idea by the end of this week so we can present it to the other grades on Monday so we can have a vote on which is the best idea.” He looked down at his notes. “According to my notes, we’ve come up with exactly… zero ideas.”  
“How come this is taking us so long?” Wendy wondered out loud. “How have we not had any ideas yet?”  
“I’ve come up with a lot of ideas!” Butters pointed out.  
“Yeah, and they’re all stupid,” Kyle told him. “We need an actual idea.”  
“Why don’t we try doing like a word association?” Angela suggested. “What do you guys think of when you hear the words ‘Valentine’s Day’?”  
“Candy!” Butters blurted out immediately.  
“The fact that it’s placed in February in case you recovered from your loneliness from Christmas and New Year’s Eve,” Wendy said bitterly.  
“The holiday centered around a man that most people don’t even know what he did to earn his own holiday and actually has nothing to do with St. Valentine,” Kyle pointed out, leaning his head on his fist in boredom. Angela blinked in surprise at them.  
“Ok,” she muttered after a moment. “What about ‘dances’?”  
“With wolves!” Butters said after a moment, looking extremely proud of himself.  
“Boring, lame and stupid,” Kyle said.  
“The thing that adults force us to go to because ‘it will be fun’ but is actually just awkward and boring,” Wendy replied, looking like she would rather be anywhere else.  
“I don’t think we’re getting anywhere with this,” Angela sighed.  
“What was your first clue?” Wendy growled under her breath.

Kenny sat in his room, playing his PSP late at night when the phone rang. He glanced over and let out a sigh as he went to answer it, as neither of his parents were there at the moment. Keeping one hand on his game, he picked up the phone.  
“Hello?” he greeted to whoever was on the other side.  
“Hey Kenny, it’s Kyle,” he heard his friend say. Kenny paused his game.  
“Kyle, what’s wrong?” he asked. His friend seemed at war with himself, and it was dripping all over his voice. Kyle hesitated for a moment before answering.  
“I think Angela really does have a crush on me,” he told him.  
“How do you know?” Kenny wondered, his attention now completely on his friend.  
“Remember earlier at lunch time?” Kyle asked. “After Craig and those other guys sat down… she started rubbing my leg, dude. Even though Stan was sitting right there.”  
Kenny stood in surprised silence for a moment. “So that’s why you just flipped out and left like that,” he muttered mostly to himself.  
“I wasn’t finished,” Kyle told him. “At the dance planning committee, she stared at me the entire time, like she didn’t think that I noticed. Then when the meeting was over, she walked behind me and pinched the back of my neck.”  
“Why do people think that’s a good flirting move?” Kenny wondered. “It just freaks whoever you’re pinching out and drop whatever they were doing.”  
“I don’t know, dude,” his friend replied. “But can we stay on track here? What am I going to do? Should I tell Stan?”  
“I’m not sure about that,” Kenny said reluctantly. “Like or not, Stan’s kind of a jealous asshole. He might not believe you.”  
Kyle wanted to defend his friend, but he did have to admit that Stan did get pretty jealous from time to time. He let out a sigh.  
“Then what am I supposed to do?” he asked Kenny after a moment.  
“Maybe you should try talking to her instead,” Kenny said, thinking it over. “Maybe it’s just a huge misunderstanding or something. Or maybe if you just tell her that you’re not interested in her then she’ll realize her mistake and stop.”  
Kyle sighed again. “I don’t think that will work,” he admitted. “But I’ve really got no other option. This really has to stop.”  
“Just don’t tell her it was my idea, dude,” Kenny told him.

The next day after the dance planning committee was over with (Butters had brought a bunch of romance novels his mother was reading and they just read random passages to try and pick ideas), Kyle quickly pulled Angela aside before she could go home.  
“Hey, Angela, I need to talk to you for one second,” he told her.  
“Okay,” she said happily. They waited for the others to leave before Kyle turned to the girl, who just smiled expectantly at him. Kyle paused for a moment as he tried to think of how to word his concerns.  
“Ok, here’s the thing,” Kyle started. But before he could actually continue with his train of thought, Angela pushed him against the wall, and as he was asking what she was doing, she kissed him deeply.  
Taken completely off guard, Kyle felt her force his mouth open and slip in her tongue before he could figure out what was going on. When his brain finally caught up to the rest of him, he tried to push her away from him, but she had wrapped her arms around him and refused to let go, pressing him hard against the wall and kissing him deeper. He felt himself begin to panic and his mind start to shut down. He carefully pulled his leg in between them and finally managed to kick her away from him, making her double over with shock.  
“What did you do that for?” Angela wondered, looking up at him with a slight glare. Kyle glared daggers back at her, his breaths coming in shallow gasps.  
“Why did you just kiss me?” he growled at her, trying to back away. She smiled innocently at him, as if she didn’t understand what the problem was.  
“Because you’re cute,” she replied sweetly. “I really like you. I think we have a real connection between us. You can’t deny the chemistry between us.”  
“You’re crazy,” Kyle hissed at her. “I knew you were trying to flirt with me, but I didn’t think you’d do something like this. You’re supposed to be dating Stan. He’s the one who likes you. And you’re insane if you think there’s anything going on between us.”  
“It’s true,” Angela admitted. “I did go on a date with Stan. And I do like him. But I guess I was just too hasty in going out with him. I think you’re much better than him.”  
She stood to her full height again, and Kyle took a cautious step towards the door.  
“I’m telling Stan,” he growled. “I’m telling him what you just did.” To his surprise, she just laughed in response. It was a kind of cold, unnatural laugh; almost the exact opposite of the one she had been using when she was around others.  
“Sure, go ahead, tell him,” she said. “Will he believe you though?” Kyle opened his mouth to reply, but froze, unable to speak. “My guess is he’ll think you’re jealous of him and his hot new girlfriend and just brush you off. But if you really think he’ll believe you, I can dial up his number right now. I mean, I’ll deny everything you say but…”  
Kyle couldn’t answer, and just narrowed his eyes at her in anger. “You’re a bitch,” he hissed. She smiled and walked over to him, slamming her fists into the wall on either side of him to prevent him from escaping. With a sly grin, she pressed herself against him, keeping her lips inches from his.  
“Maybe,” she replied almost in a whisper. “But before Valentine’s Day is over, I promise you that I will make you mine, Kyle.” She kissed him hard on the mouth again before stepping back and finally making her exit. Kyle stared in shock at the space in front of him before pressing his back against the wall and sliding to the floor, breathing heavily.  
Little did he or Angela know that someone had been listening in the shadows and had heard every single word of their conversation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that escalated quickly. I was debating on how I wanted that last scene to play out, but I think what happened here was better than what I originally planned on happening, which was going to be just Angela denying it all and that’s that.  
> Anyone want to guess on who was listening in on their conversation? I’ll give you a cookie if you’re right. And if I actually feel like making or buying a cookie. And if I don’t eat the cookie first. Anyways, next time we’ll see what Angela is planning, what Wendy is planning, what Stan has been doing, and why the hell they haven’t come up with an idea for the dance yet. Remember to review! And tip your waiter!


	9. Hate is a Strong Word, but I really, really, really don't like you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just so you know, you’re not finding out who was listening in on their conversation from the last chapter until near the end of the story (partly because it’ll be more dramatic that way, and partly because I haven’t made up my mind about who overheard it all).  
> So, anyways, this chapter we’ll be seeing more of Stan and more of Wendy. And Angela. This is not going to end well.
> 
> “Say, won’t you say forever, stay…”

Stan had had a perfectly lovely day, devoid of any drama or conflict beyond wondering what he should have for lunch. His parents hadn’t been doing anything stupid or embarrassing lately, and he had a new girlfriend that he adored. Wendy seemed like just a distant memory to him now. Even with that disaster of a first date, he could tell that there was something special between him and Angela.  
As he lay on his bed, reading a comic book and loving life, there was a sudden knock on the door downstairs. Knowing that their parents weren’t home, he heard his sister immediately shout up to him from wherever in the house she was.  
“STAN! GET THE DOOR!” Shelly screamed at him. Stan couldn’t help but roll his eyes and yell back.  
“Really? Is that what you do when someone knocks?” he growled sarcastically at her. “Thanks, I had no idea!” Then with a huff he went to answer the door. To his surprise, Angela was standing there, holding a tissue and sniffling, with tears shining in her eyes. “Angela?” Stan greeted, shocked. “What’s wrong? Why are you crying?”  
“Oh Stan!” Angela cried out, throwing her arms around him. “I just can’t hold myself back any longer! It was horrible!” Stan blinked.  
“It’s ok,” he said, wrapping an arm around her and leading her inside. “You don’t need to cry, you can tell me anything!” He took her over to his couch, where they sat for a long moment as he comforted her. She took deep, shuddering breaths, and it took a while before she could speak again. “So, what happened that made you cry like that?” he asked her.  
“Well,” Angela sniffed. “You know how I was telling you how I thought your friend Kyle had a crush on me?”  
A lump began to form in Stan’s throat and it dropped straight to his stomach. It had been one of his earliest conversations with Angela, but he had just brushed it off back then. “Yes, I remember,” he said slowly, dreading her next words.  
“Well, I was right!” she sobbed. “He’s been pinching me flirtatiously, and when we were sitting next to each other in the lunch room he tried to rub my knee! And then today, after the dance planning committee, I decided that enough was enough! I pulled him aside to tell him that my heart belonged to you and only you and do you know what he did?” Stan remained silent as she blew into her tissue again, dread slowly creeping up on him. “He kissed me, Stan!”  
“No!” Stan denied, shaking his head in disbelief. “He couldn’t have! Kyle’s my best friend, he would never do something like that!”  
“He predicted you wouldn’t believe me,” Angela replied in a defeated tone. “He said he was going to tell you that I was the one who kissed him if I tried to tell you, but I just had to! I couldn’t bear the thought of him lying to you like that! But you just have to believe me! I don’t know what he was going to do if I hadn’t been able to get out of there!”  
Then she buried her head in her hands and sobbed. Stan quickly wrapped his arms around her, patting her on the back comfortingly. “Of course, I believe you,” he replied softly. “It must have torn you up inside to confess that. You don’t want to put a rift between me and Kyle.”  
“I don’t!” Angela wailed. “But I just had to tell you, no matter what!”  
“Don’t worry, I won’t let him get anywhere near you again,” Stan told her, his heart steeling into resolve. “You don’t have to worry about a thing.”  
“You won’t tell him I told you, will you?” Angela said, sniffing loudly. “I don’t want to make him angrier than he already is!”  
“Of course, I won’t,” Stan promised. “What are boyfriends for?” He stood up. “Do you want me to get you anything?”  
“Hot cocoa would be nice,” Angela said after a moment of thinking it over.  
“Two hot cocoas coming right up,” Stan said and left the room, leaving Angela to lean back on the couch in content, the tears she had summoned no longer on her scheming face.

The next day, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman stood silently at the bus stop, not saying anything and waiting for Stan to show. Kyle was barely keeping himself awake, as he hadn’t been able to sleep much the night before, worrying about his situation and what Angela was planning. Kenny glanced down the street with a sigh and pulled out his videogame that he had managed to stuff into his backpack. Cartman, on the other hand, was standing like a statue, since Kyle had started to lean on him to keep himself from falling over.  
“Damn it,” Kenny said suddenly, making his two friends jump. “Where is Stan already? The bus is going to be here any minute!”  
“Maybe he’s getting a blow job from his new girlfriend,” Cartman said dismissively.  
“Do you ever think about the things you’re going to say before you say them?” Kyle asked, glaring slightly at him. Cartman tried not to blush.  
“I think about what I’m going to say sometimes,” he mumbled to himself.  
Kyle was about to answer him, but at that moment, Stan finally arrived, and Kyle was distressed to see that Angela was close behind him. Stan went to his usual place, standing further away from the others than usual. As Angela walked past him, Kyle felt her pinch the back of his neck and he flinched. Taking a deep breath, he turned to Stan, trying to smile.  
“Hey, dude!” he greeted, trying to be cheerful. Stan didn’t answer him, and his only movement was to narrow his eyes coldly at him. Kyle frowned, immediately understanding. “Oh no,” he muttered. “She didn’t.” He took a step away from Angela and glared at her. “You did, didn’t you?”  
Angela gave him an innocent smile. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said in her sweetest voice. “What did I do?”  
“You went straight to Stan and lied about what happened yesterday, didn’t you?” Kyle hissed at her. “You son of a bitch!”  
“Don’t call my girlfriend a bitch, Kyle,” Stan growled at him, stepping in between him and Angela and shooting his friend a look of pure anger. “She didn’t lie, she told me everything that’s been happening!”  
“What happened?” Kenny wondered, looking between his two friends in pure shock.  
“She kissed me,” Kyle growled, still glaring at Angela.  
“I did not!” Angela cried, looking heartbroken. “I would never do such a thing! You kissed me!”  
“Why would I ever kiss a witch like you?” Kyle snarled. Angela immediately burst into tears, covering her face with her hands. Stan took another step towards him, his anger radiating off him and forcing his friend to take another step back.  
“Kyle, I’m warning you,” he said slowly. “You better lay off my girlfriend.”  
“Well tell your girlfriend to stay away from me,” Kyle snapped at him. “I can’t believe you believe her over me!”  
“I can’t believe you’re trying to steal my girlfriend,” Stan replied, baring his teeth at him.  
“I am not trying to steal your girlfriend,” Kyle responded, taking another step back. “I don’t even like her!” Angela let out another huge sob. Kenny and Cartman exchanged shocked glances and Kenny took a timid step forward.  
“Stan…” he started.  
“Shut up, Kenny,” Stan hissed at him. “This doesn’t concern you!” Kenny stared back at him as if he had been bitten by him. Before anyone could make another move, however, the bus finally rode up and opened its doors. Stan angrily turned his back and climbed on board, effectively ending the argument.  
Angela immediately stopped her fake sobbing, gave Kyle a wicked grin and quickly climbed on after him. Cartman and Kenny stepped up to Kyle’s side and noticed that he was shaking, but from anger or shock, they couldn’t tell.  
“Come on,” Kyle said in a hoarse whisper. “Let’s just get on the fucking bus.” Then he also climbed on, leaving Cartman and Kenny to exchange another glance and climb on after him.

The moment Wendy climbed onto the bus, she could tell that something was wrong. Kyle, Kenny and Cartman all sat in the front of the bus, and she could see Stan and Angela sitting all the way in the back. And Stan kept glaring daggers at the front seats. Utterly confused, Wendy decided to sit down next to Cartman in the front instead of her friends (who were all sitting near the back and she didn’t want to hear Stan and Angela flirt with each other anyways).  
“What’s going on?” she asked him. “Why are you guys sitting apart?”  
“Stan and Kyle had a fight,” the fat kid told her with a sigh. “Apparently Angela told Stan that Kyle was putting the moves on her or some crap like that.” Wendy frowned.  
“Kyle wouldn’t do that,” she pointed out.  
“Try telling that to Stan,” Cartman replied, rolling his eyes. For a moment Wendy thought about actually going up to Stan and telling him he was an idiot, but she didn’t think that would really accomplish anything.  
She glanced over to where Kyle and Kenny sat in the aisle across from them. Kyle sat nearest to the window, angrily staring out of it while Kenny pressed comfortingly to his side. She looked back at Cartman, who cocked an eyebrow at her.  
“So, what’s the plan to take this bitch down?” Wendy asked, pounding a fist into her hand. Cartman blinked in surprise at her.  
“I didn’t know we were supposed to be coming up with a plan,” he admitted. Wendy let out a sigh.  
“Come on, we have to do something! We can’t let her get away with whatever the hell she’s planning!” Wendy pointed out. Kenny and Kyle glanced at her in surprise, as if they had both just realized she was there.  
“What would you know about it?” Kyle asked. “I didn’t think you needed a reason to try and get rid of the girl that’s dating your ex-boyfriend.” Wendy frowned at him.  
“This is totally different,” she replied. “This is about principle.”  
“You don’t even know what happened,” Kenny pointed out calmly.  
“Neither do you,” Wendy snapped at him. Kyle rolled his eyes and looked back out the window, wondering how their conversation already got so derailed. It probably would explain how Angela was winning at the moment. But he wasn’t going to just let her have her own way and destroy his friendship with Stan. Not if he had anything to say about it. This meant war.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I can’t think of a better way to end this chapter, so I’m going to end it right here. Next time we’re going to have something special that I’ve planned out and hopefully it will be especially hilarious.  
> Angela’s quite a bitch, isn’t she? She subscribes to one of my least favorite romantic comedy clichés of all time: the girl who’s dating one guy, is “secretly” in love with another guy who’s in love with her, and the guys she’s dating is supposed to be the bad guy in all of this. It’s everywhere in romantic comedies (try and tell me that it’s not) and it’s annoying the fuck out of me! So, Angela’s attempting to re-enact that stupid cliché to the letter. Just so you know.  
> Anyways, don’t forget to review after you read. And remember, Freddy loves you!


	10. Deja Moo (The feeling you've heard this bull before)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I may have been updating this series way too fast, but I can’t help it. I’ve never been on such a huge roll in my life! So yes, I am starting this chapter right after completing the previous chapter. Deal with it. (Love you!)
> 
> “If you stay forever, hey…”

Kyle lay on his bed staring up at the ceiling, wondering where exactly in his life had gone wrong. He still had trouble coming to grips with the fact that Stan would sooner believe this girl he barely knew than his best friend that he knew his entire life. He let out a sigh, wondering if he should just call Stan and try to explain himself. Not that Stan would listen.  
He was broken out of his thoughts when he heard his mother call up to him that dinner was ready. Letting out another sigh, he wondered if he should just tell his mother that he wasn’t hungry and just skip dinner. But he knew that she wouldn’t let him do that, so he slowly rolled off his bed and made his way down the stairs. Just as he was about to reach the dining room, there was a knock at the door.  
A feeling of dread came over him and for a moment he considered not answering it and hoping the person on the other side would just leave. But then he told himself to stop being childish and went to answer the door. He was annoyed to see Angela standing there, smiling seductively at him when he finally opened it.  
“What are you doing here?” Kyle hissed at her. She looked shock for a brief moment.  
“Wait a minute, this isn’t my house!” she said. “How silly of me! Well, since I’m here, I might as well stay for dinner, you know?”  
Kyle didn’t move. “How did you find my house?” he demanded.  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Angela said sweetly. “I’m just a poor girl who got lost on her way home. It’s not like I’ve been stalking you or anything.”  
“I’m not inviting you into my house,” he told her, narrowing his eyes. “Especially not after all that you’ve done to me.”  
She opened her mouth to reply, but at that moment, Kyle’s mom appeared in the entry way.  
“Kyle, who’s this?” she asked her son. Angela gave her a winning smile.  
“I’m Angela,” she said before Kyle could speak. “Kyle and I are classmates. He asked me over for dinner.”  
“I did not,” Kyle insisted, but he was cut off.  
“Kyle, don’t be rude,” his mother told him. “Let that poor girl in, it’s freezing out there!” Then she turned and made her way back into the dining room. Kyle groaned and reluctantly stepped aside to let Angela in. Angela grinned, leaned forward and kissed him deeply before brushing past him and walking towards the dining room.  
Kyle stared after her in anger, wishing he could talk to someone who would actually believe him about how terrible Angela was. He let out a long sigh and started making his way towards the dining room himself. Once again, he didn’t get very far when there was yet another knock on the front door.  
“What is it now?” he groaned to himself, turning around to go answer it. He couldn’t decide if he was surprised or not to see Cartman standing there. “What do you want, Cartman?” he asked, weariness creeping into his voice.  
Cartman had a feeling that his “getting lost while on the way home” excuse probably wouldn’t work a second time, so he quickly thought of something else.  
“My mom’s been bugging me to clean my room and wouldn’t let me leave until I did,” he told him. Kyle continued to stand there, cocking an eyebrow at him. “So, I climbed out the window and made my way over here.”  
“And you couldn’t go to either Stan or Kenny’s houses because?” Kyle asked him. Cartman blinked at him for a moment.  
“Your house is closer,” he finally decided on. Kyle would have loved to point out that his house was definitely not the closest to Cartman’s house, but he really didn’t envy the thought of spending an entire evening with Angela alone, and even Cartman’s company was more welcome. He let out a sigh and opened the door wider for him to pass through.  
“Come on in,” he offered. Cartman smiled and walked past him. “I have to warn you that Angela’s here as well,” Kyle told him. Cartman paused for a moment.  
“Why the fuck is she here?” he wondered.  
“The same reason you were here last week,” Kyle muttered, walking past him and leading the way into the dining room. The rest of his family were already sitting down, and they looked up surprised when Kyle entered with Cartman right behind him. “Yeah, I forgot to tell you, mom,” he said in a rather dull tone. “Cartman’s here because we’re supposed to work on a project or something.”  
“Well, why didn’t you say so?” his mother said, with a slightly crazed smile on her face. “Of course, he can stay for dinner.” She nudged her husband in the back. “Go get more silverware, dear,” she ordered. Gerald let out a grumble and stalked off into the kitchen, annoyed with constantly having to get up.  
Angela glared across at Cartman who gave her a smug grin. The two of them sat down, with Cartman sitting in between Kyle and Angela, which just made her glare at him even harder. The annoyingly awkward tension immediately came in as everyone except Kyle began to eat. There was little conversation as even Kyle’s parents could sense the awkwardness of the entire situation.  
“So, how did you two meet this young lady here?” Gerald decided to ask to break the silence.  
“Angela is Stan’s new girlfriend,” Cartman said before Angela could stop him.  
“Yeah,” Angela said nervously. “And since I am, we wanted to get to know each other better, which is why Kyle’s so kindly invited me to his house.”  
Cartman gave Kyle a look that asked “You invited her?” while Kyle shot a glare back at him that obviously said “No, I didn’t!” His parents went back to focusing on their food, so they didn’t catch any of their looks, nor the look of anger Angela shot at Cartman.  
“So, have you gotten an idea for what your little dance is going be like yet?” Sheila asked a couple minutes later.  
“Not even sort of,” Kyle said with a long sigh.  
“I still don’t remember signing up for that thing,” Cartman muttered under his breath.  
“Well, what ideas have you come up with?” Gerald wondered.  
“Absolutely nothing,” Cartman said, somewhat proudly.  
“We’ve come up with ideas,” Angela said sweetly. “We just haven’t found the right one yet. It has to have that special touch, you know?”  
“Or just be an idea that doesn’t suck,” Kyle muttered under his breath, soft enough so his parents wouldn’t hear.

Kyle lay awake in bed, wondering how it had come to this. After dinner, both Cartman and Angela had come up with a totally legit reason for staying the night and it wasn’t just because the author was too lazy to come up with an actual reason. Kyle had tried to get both of them to leave, but even his mom wasn’t helping with that.  
“I’m pretty sure both of their parents will be wondering where they are,” Kyle had said through gritted teeth, trying to give his mom a hint through the look on his face. But she simply smiled at him.  
“Don’t worry, I’ve already called their parents and told them that they were staying the night,” she said happily. “So, you can play with your friends even longer.” Kyle stared at her in disbelief as she walked away. Then Angela had come up behind him and pinched his neck again, causing him to jump and spin around.  
“So,” she said in what she clearly thought was a seductive voice. “Where am I sleeping?”  
“Living room,” Kyle growled at her, walking away. She blinked in surprise and followed him, trying to protest, but he pulled out a spare pillow from a nearby closet and beaned her in the face with it. He pulled out another pillow and tossed it at Cartman, who just barely managed to catch it in time.  
The two of them had just stayed in Kyle’s room for a while until Cartman finally fell asleep, which left Kyle to just lie awake and wish all this crap was happening to someone else.  
Once again though, Cartman was not asleep, and was in fact wide awake. He lay facing the door, prepared for if Angela were to try and sneak in there. He had suspected that she was trying to get Kyle alone, and he didn’t believe any of her bullshit stories about what had happened the other day for a second. And this afternoon when he looked out the window of his house and saw her walking down the street, he had this weird feeling that she was making her way to Kyle’s house, which is why he had decided to follow her. And when his fears had been confirmed, he knew he couldn’t leave his friend alone with that witch, so he had also knocked on the door.  
He was quite proud of himself. There was no way Angela could sneak in to do dirty things to Kyle if he was there, she would just trip over him! The perfect plan! But then again, what if he fell asleep and he couldn’t see the door? Or if she just sneaked around him? Or if he fell asleep and she just sneaked around him?  
He couldn’t take the risk. He thought of just moving to right behind the door, but even he knew that was a dumb idea. He knew that Kyle hadn’t fallen asleep yet, due to his breathing not even sort of slowing down, and he thought about rousing him and discussing his problem. But he didn’t want to make Kyle angrier than he already was.  
Eventually he heard Kyle’s breathing soften and slow, and when he looked up, the smaller boy had finally fallen asleep. He waited a few more minutes, then slowly and carefully got up and tiptoed over to him. Kyle had turned his back to him, and gave no signs of waking up, so Cartman grabbed his own blanket off the floor, lay down on top of the covers and threw his own blanket back over himself, pressing his back to Kyle’s, and closing his eyes.  
The moment Kyle felt something press against him, his eyes snapped open and he was immediately wide awake. He sat up and saw that Cartman was curled up next to him, and that immediately sent him into a panic. Why was Cartman on his bed next to him? And why did it look like he had already fallen back asleep?  
“Ugh…” was the only sound that he seemed to be able to make, and let it draw out. Cartman didn’t even so much as stir. “Cartman?” he called, hoping that he would wake up. It didn’t happen. He gave him a hard shove. “Cartman!” he said as loud as he could but still trying to remain quiet. Still, the larger boy slept on. Was he really that heavy of a sleeper? Or was he seriously just ignoring him for whatever reason? Well, what was he supposed to do now?  
Should he try and shove him off the bed? It wasn’t like that was the easiest thing in the world. And since he hadn’t gotten any sleep the night before, combined with Cartman’s weight he doubted he would be able to accomplish that. And he really didn’t want to know what would happen if he actually did manage to push Cartman off his bed.  
But why is he in my bed at all? Kyle wondered, panic rising in him again. Did Cartman sleep walk? Did he get up for whatever reason and when he came back he just simply forgot this wasn’t his room? He’s not going to wake up anytime soon, is he? He thought with a sigh. He fell on to his back with a groan, resigning himself to the situation. He rolled over with his back to Cartman’s staring through the darkness at his wall. Looks like he wasn’t going to sleep at all again tonight.  
Cartman felt Kyle shift around behind him, but he didn’t dare turn around. It was better if he just thought that he was still asleep. It was better than trying to explain why he had decided to switch sleeping locations. Even when Kyle shook him roughly he continued to pretend to be asleep. He didn’t know if he was falling for it, but at the moment he didn’t really care.  
He felt guilty when he felt Kyle begin to shiver against him, but his attention was drawn to the faintest, tiniest movement at the door. Anyone not paying attention wouldn’t notice the door slowly opening until it was wide enough to poke a head through. And Angela did poke her head through, and it took her a moment for her eyes to adjust. When they did, she saw Cartman glaring at her through the darkness. She glared back at him.  
There was a long moment of the two of them glaring angrily at each other before finally, Angela gave up. She closed the door softly and stomped back downstairs. He heard Kyle take a sharp breath, and for a moment he wondered if his friend knew that she had been here. He smiled smugly to himself. Angela wasn’t going to get her way. Not if he had anything to say about it. And Cartman knew that the battle wasn’t over. Looks like he wasn’t going to be getting any sleep tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this is a good place to end this chapter. It’s slightly longer than a few recent chapters, but that’s because I knew where I was going with this chapter.  
> Anyways, I probably won’t start working on the next chapter until I’m done writing up the time line for this fan fiction (yes, I’m doing a time line). I started it so I could figure out pacing and where plot points should go, but I’ve barely started on it, so I need to work on that. I know some of what I’m going to do next chapter, but it will take a little longer.  
> Remember to leave a review and stop making stupid people famous.


	11. Bitch Mother, Come Light my Bottom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, hopefully I’ll stop not knowing what’s going to happen in a chapter now that I’ve actually typed up a time line for this. But on the downside, I also have school and other fan fictions to work on as well.  
> Anyways, Enjoy.
> 
> “Hey, we can stay forever young…”

After not being able to sleep for two days, Kyle felt like one of the most difficult things he ever had to do was attempt to get out of bed and actually go to school the next morning. He had maybe gotten a grand total of two hours of sleep in those two days, and he didn’t like the thought of having to make it through another day on that kind of energy.  
He was hoping that if he just fell back asleep everyone would assume that he was dead and just leave him alone. But, five minutes after he threw his alarm through the window, he felt himself be shaken awake by a heavy hand. Groaning, he rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, but whoever was shaking him wouldn’t leave him alone.  
“Come on, wake up, Kyle,” he heard Cartman growl at him. “Your mom says to get up, and we’re going to miss the bus.”  
“Good,” Kyle mumbled into his pillow, not even sort of attempting to move. Cartman frowned at him and let out a sigh. He quickly climbed over his friend (who just gave an annoyed groan) until he was on the other side of the bed. He paused for a moment then kicked his feet out, shoving Kyle right out of bed. The smaller boy let out a frightened yelp and fell to the floor. Quite satisfied with himself, Cartman peered over the side at him. Kyle had barely moved. “I hate you,” he growled up at him after a moment.  
Cartman tried not to let his words sting him, reminding himself that before this fan fiction started he was still operating under the illusion that he and Kyle hated each other and that Kyle still thought that. “So, are you going to get up or what?” he asked him.  
“Is there a reason why you were sleeping next to me last night?” Kyle asked suddenly, taking Cartman completely off guard. For some reason, it hadn’t occurred to him that Kyle would simply ask what was up with last night the next day, and he couldn’t pretend to be asleep this time around.  
“Um, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Cartman muttered, trying not to look at him. Kyle opened his eyes and glared up at him.  
“Yes, you do,” he growled. “You know exactly what I’m talking about. Instead of sleeping on the floor, you chose to occupy my bed sometime during the night instead.”  
“Oh that,” Cartman mumbled. “I forgot that I was sleeping on the floor.” Kyle stared up at him with the biggest look of annoyance and disbelief he had ever given.  
“You forgot that you were sleeping on the floor?” he asked, sarcasm filling his voice.  
“Yes,” Cartman replied.  
“While you were still sleeping on the floor.”  
“Yup.”  
Kyle let out a rather long sigh, passing a hand over his eyes in frustration. He knew that was the only answer he was going to get out of him, and he really shouldn’t push it; but really, Cartman couldn’t have thought of a better reason than that? With another sigh of frustration, he slowly pushed himself off his floor, threw his blanket half-hazardly back onto his bed (which instead hit Cartman in the face), and got dressed while Cartman struggled to find his way out from underneath the blanket.  
“I think you broke my back,” Kyle grumbled as they headed down the stairs together.  
“You’ll get over it,” said Cartman nonchalantly.  
Kyle hesitated as they got downstairs, but he didn’t hear or see Angela anywhere. Then he realized that she probably had left early so they wouldn’t all arrive at the bus stop together and therefore Stan wouldn’t become suspicious. He almost wished that she hadn’t thought that far ahead. But, as he stepped over the broken alarm clock on the walk way he was sort of glad that Cartman had been there for whatever reason. He probably would have gone insane if he had been trapped in his house alone with Angela. Even if Cartman wasn’t that much better.  
Sure enough, Stan, Kenny, and Angela were already waiting at the bus stop. Stan refused to acknowledge his friend as they joined them, and Kenny gave them both a slightly awkward but still warm greeting.  
“Am I the only one who’s not going to be almost late for the bus?” Kenny wondered out loud, trying to lighten the mood. Still running on only two hours of sleep, Kyle leaned heavily on him.  
“I got no sleep last night,” he mumbled. Kenny, trying to stay standing, looked in shock at him.  
“How are you getting so little sleep, dude?” he asked. “You were like this last week too.” For a moment, Kyle considered telling them about how Cartman and Angela had just randomly showed up at his house, but he knew that Stan would immediately yell at him, and that Angela would deny everything again. Sure, he had Cartman as a witness, but he was convinced that he wouldn’t actually back him and also deny everything.  
So, it came as an especially large shock when, as they were all standing there in silence and Kyle tried to think of an appropriate answer to Kenny’s question, Cartman suddenly turned to Stan and spoke loudly.  
“So, Stan,” he said, casting a wicked grin. “Guess where Angela was last night?”  
Stan turned in confusion to look at him, not noticing Angela glaring at the fat kid with pure, unmasked hatred. “Okay, I’ll bite,” he said. “Where was she?”  
“At Kyle’s house,” Cartman said immediately before either Angela or Kyle could stop him.  
Stan gave him a blank stare, as if he couldn’t decide if he was really being serious or not. “And how would you know that?” he wondered. Cartman blinked at him and Kyle flinched.  
“Because I also happened to be there at the time,” Cartman revealed.  
“You’re crazy,” Angela growled at him.  
“Why were you at Kyle’s?” Kenny wondered. Cartman rolled his eyes.  
“Because, my mom was trying to get me to clean my room so I snuck out,” he told him as if he was tired of explaining himself (even if he had only explained it twice now).  
“You’re just saying all this just to annoy me,” Stan growled at him. “What makes you think you can just throw accusations around like that?”  
“He’s not lying,” Kyle pointed out calmly. “They were both at my house last night.”  
“And how do we know that you’re not just agreeing with each other to try and make yourself look good?” Angela spoke up, folding her arms.  
“Because Kyle’s not a liar,” Kenny told her, deciding to give his two cents.  
“No one asked you, Kenny,” Stan growled.  
“And no one asked your bitch of a girlfriend to invade my house, but she did it anyways,” Kyle snapped at him. Stan glared at him, and Kyle got the feeling that the only reason he didn’t try to strangle him was because Cartman and Angela were both standing in the way.  
“Why don’t you just stay away from my girlfriend, Kyle,” Stan ordered with a growl.  
“I would love to, but she won’t stay away from me,” he replied, also folding his arms.  
Before Stan could attempt to get around two people and kill his best friend, Kenny quickly stepped in between them, holding up his hands and stopping Stan in his tracks. The look of outrage on his face made even Cartman flinch away from him.  
“That’s enough!” he snarled, mostly at Stan. “Can we go at least one day without everyone breaking into a fight? I am not going to be the one who stands here and picks up all the dead bodies once everyone’s killed each other! Now, the bus has been here for five minutes, so we are going to get on the fucking bus, go to fucking school, and never speak again until we get to college, IF we survive that long! Got it?”  
Then without waiting for an answer, he turned Stan around and shoved him onto the bus, before shoving Angela in after him. Then he spun around to glare at Kyle and Cartman, both of whom immediately ran over to climb onto the bus with a start. Calming down, Kenny finally followed them.  
Inside, they found all of kids sitting on one side of the bus, sitting up on their knees and at the window, obviously having gone over to see the fight that had broken out. Even the bus driver was hurrying back to her seat with a look of shock, as all the kids quickly retook their seats, trying to make it look like they hadn’t been watching the entire time. No one made eye contact as Stan and Angela hurried to the back and the other three awkwardly took the nearest unoccupied seats. There wasn’t a single, solitary sound made for the rest of the journey.

Wendy was really surprised when she stepped onto the bus and saw not a single person talking to each other. She noticed Stan once again sitting in the back with his fuck buddy, and the anger radiating off him was directed straight at his friends sitting near the front.  
“What’s going on?” Wendy asked Bebe as she sat down next to her. Her friend looked like her birthday had come early or something with all the gossip she had fallen upon.  
“Stan, Kyle and Cartman had a huge fight with each other,” she told Wendy in a low voice. “Angela stayed over at Kyle’s house, and Stan won’t hear a word of it! They won’t even speak to each other now, even though Cartman confirmed the whole thing!”  
Wendy didn’t know what to question first; the fact that Cartman was apparently also at Kyle’s house, the fact that he was willing to side with Kyle, or the fact that Stan seemed to be in unbelievable denial. She also knew she should question why she should care, but she felt the bigger question why it seemed that everyone else in their class seemed to care. At least she had an excuse, but everyone else she could tell without even looking that they were all staring at either Stan and Angela or the guys up front.  
“It’s going to be one of those weeks, isn’t it, Bebe?” Wendy eventually asked with a sigh.  
“Yes. Yes, it is,” Bebe answered matter-of-factly, not even sort of looking put out.  
“Maybe someone should talk to Stan,” Wendy decided.  
“Good luck with that,” her friend immediately replied.  
To be honest, Wendy wasn’t quite sure if she was the best person to talk to Stan, but nobody else seemed to want to get into the middle of this. She knew Stan wouldn’t listen to her either (especially if he didn’t seem to even be listening to his own friends), and maybe he would more likely just chalk everything she tried to say to him as jealousy, but frankly, she was also getting tired of Angela having her own way all the time. If she could make Stan open his eyes even a little bit, she knew she had to try. Especially since she knew exactly what to say to him.  
The hardest part was trying to find a time where Angela wasn’t clinging to Stan like a little girl who was afraid of losing her mother in a large crowd of people. But, finally, she saw them part as they both went to their lockers. As soon as Angela rounded a corner, Wendy turned and strode over to her ex-boyfriend.  
“Hey, Stan,” she greeted him. “Can I talk to you for a second?”  
Stan blinked in surprise at her. “Um, yeah, I guess,” he said, not moving. She opened her mouth to speak, but then realized that Kenny was standing next to him, leaning on the lockers and also waiting for her to speak. Wendy frowned at him.  
“I meant alone,” she said directly to Kenny, who blinked at her.  
“Fine,” he muttered under his breath, starting to slump away. “Didn’t want to hear what you had to say anyways.”  
Wendy took a deep breath before continuing. “So, I hear you got into an argument with your friends,” she started. She held up a hand when he opened his mouth to try and argue, and she closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she glared at him. “Are you kidding? Are you fucking kidding me, Stan?” He blinked in shock at her, but she wasn’t done. “You are seriously telling me that you are willing to believe some girl that you barely know over your best friend who has told you on more than one occasion that he would never try to steal your ex and by extension your girlfriend?”  
Stan stared at her with surprise, not quite knowing what to say, now that Wendy was finished ranting at him. Finally, he looked down at the ground, not looking her in the eye.  
“Well of course you would take their side,” he muttered eventually. “You’re jealous of Angela. I can tell, you know.”  
“So?” Wendy said. “This isn’t about me. You didn’t even stop to consider that maybe Angela lied to you for some reason, did you? Or how extremely out of character it would be for Kyle to flirt with your girlfriend, huh?”  
Wendy didn’t give Stan time to answer as she turned on her heel and stomped away, leaving Stan to stare after her in shock. He didn’t move for a long moment, until he gave a start when someone tapped on his shoulder.  
“Man, she really chewed you out, didn’t she?” Kenny asked, somehow having appeared right beside him. Stan glared at him.  
“Shut up, Kenny,” he growled, and Kenny merely smiled at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that’s really the best place I can end before I just ramble on and on. Anything else at this point would just be filler, so there you go. Next time, we’re going to have some fun, as we’ll see (one of the things that will be happening is that Stan is going to see Dr. Pidd).  
> Anyways, make sure to leave a review telling me what you think, and remember, lunchtime is for eating food. Not throwing it at the person across from you.


	12. You say "potato," I say "What are you doing in my house?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yup, so this is the chapter I am most looking forward to (besides the carnival and some of the dance chapters). Hopefully, you’ll see why. Also, I apologize. Stan’s not going to see the therapist until chapter fourteen. Oops. But anyways, that’s all I’ve got. Hope you like it and all that.
> 
> “Singing radio head at the top of our lungs! With the boom box blaring as we’re falling in love! Got a bottle of whatever, but it’s getting us drunk, singing Here’s to never growing up!”

Later that day, Cartman sat on his couch, totally bored as there was nothing good on TV. His mom was who knows where, probably getting banged by some dude, not that he cared. He was almost in a comatose state of boredom when there was suddenly a knock on the front door, startling him out of it. He opened his mouth to call to his mom to answer the door, remembered that she wasn’t there, then begrudgingly slumped off the couch to answer it himself.  
The moment he opened the door, all of the weariness was knocked out of him. Out of all the people in the world, he never would have expected Kyle to be standing there, but he was. Looking exhausted and slightly annoyed (and maybe somewhat terrified), Kyle looked back at him with a look that told him he felt just as awkward standing there as Cartman was.  
“W-What are you doing here?” Cartman asked, annoyed at himself for being unable to keep the tremor out of his voice. Kyle sighed.  
“Okay, so here’s the thing,” he muttered after thinking it over for a moment. “My mom has been obsessively reading the Fifty Shades of Grey novels, and she and my dad decided to marathon the movies tonight.” Cartman continued to stare at him, wide-eyed. “And they’re getting way too into it.” His eyes grew a haunted look for a moment. “It was not pretty.”  
“And you decided to come to me first?” Cartman asked in disbelief, just barely managing to contain his excitement. He was glad he didn’t let it show on his face, because a moment later, Kyle shook his head.  
“Not really,” he replied. “But Stan’s still mad at me, Kenny said he wasn’t home, Tweek said he was staying over at Craig’s house, and apparently Butter’s parents are also watching Fifty Shades of Grey.” He let out another long sigh, awkwardly rubbing his arm and not looking Cartman in the eye. “So…can I hang out here for a while?” Cartman blinked at him.  
“Sure,” he stated. Kyle stared at him in complete shock, obviously surprised about him agreeing so willingly. He had opened his mouth to start arguing with him, and it took him a moment before he closed it again.  
“Um, all right then,” he muttered, before Cartman stood aside to let him in. Cartman couldn’t help but stare as Kyle shuffled slowly over to the couch and sat down, pulling his knees up to his chest and sighing. Nervously, Cartman walked over and sat down next to him.  
“Er, can I get you anything?” Cartman asked, deciding to try his hand at being a good host. “Water? Juice?” Kyle shook his head in response. “Any snacks?”  
“I’m good,” Kyle replied.  
“Oh,” Cartman sighed. “Well, I’d offer you some Valentine candy, but that’s gone.”  
Kyle gave him a confused look. “I thought you said that your mom bought that candy two days ago,” he told him.  
“Yup,” Cartman replied. “It’s gone now.”  
“Where’s your mom?” Kyle asked, deciding to change the subject.  
“Fuck if I know,” Cartman said with a shrug. “Probably off getting laid somewhere. It’s like, all she does.” He glanced at him, then at the TV, which he just realized was still on. “I can’t believe Stan’s still going out with that witch,” he said. “Especially after what I said about last night!”  
“Yeah,” Kyle sighed. “You’d think he would believe the person who hates me the most when he takes my side, wouldn’t you?” Cartman felt himself blush and he had to look away to hide it.  
“I never said I hated you,” Kyle could hear him mutter under his breath. He rolled his eyes.  
“Cartman, I still have the birthday card you gave me last year that says ‘Happy Birthday, I hate you,’” he pointed out. “’Hate, Cartman.’”  
The rational side of Cartman’s brain wondered why he had kept that card, but the much larger, irrational side had already come up with a reason and was just feeling flattered that he did keep it. Once again, Cartman tried not to let it show on his face.  
They sat in silence for a moment before Kyle suddenly turned to look at him.  
“By the way, I wanted to thank you for sticking up for me this morning,” he said in a softer voice than he probably meant. “I didn’t think that you would actually try to help like that, and it was totally disastrous, but still, thanks for defending me.”  
Cartman had absolutely no idea how he should react to his statement. Should he just brush it off? Say it was only to make Angela miserable? Because he thought it would be funny? Should he actually reply earnestly to the thanks?  
After a good five or six seconds of just sitting there awkwardly with his mouth hanging open, Cartman abruptly stood up. He muttered something about “needing to get a snack from the kitchen” before racing off into the other room, leaving Kyle to stare after him in confusion. When he finally managed to collect himself, Cartman quickly grabbed a bag of chips and two cans of sodas from the fridge before returning to the living room.  
Kyle had relaxed slightly and had pulled out his phone, keeping his legs pulled up as he stared down at the screen. He looked up when Cartman set one of the cans on the table in front of him. Then he looked over at the fat kid as he sat down again.  
“I said I didn’t want anything,” he pointed out calmly.  
“Who are you texting?” Cartman asked instead of responding.  
“No one,” he replied after a moment. “Stan and Angela have been annoyingly tweeting since yesterday. My phone won’t shut up about it.”  
“Why don’t you just turn off the notifications?” Cartman wondered.  
“Because most of it are lies about me,” Kyle growled. “Especially Angela’s. She just won’t let it go. She doesn’t seem to grasp the fact this isn’t going to make me like her at all.” He sighed and put his phone back in his pocket. “I wish I hadn’t pulled her aside to try and talk to her. This is turning into such a huge mess.”  
Cartman wished he could offer up some sort of wise, sagely advice, but he really couldn’t think of anything to ease his friend’s worries. There was a strange sound and Kyle quickly pulled out his phone again, looked at with a frown, then sighed and put it back into his pocket.  
“I hate my life,” he said mostly to himself.  
Cartman was tempted to pull out his own phone and see what exactly Stan and Angela were saying, but he didn’t feel like he could solve anything by doing that and he was bent on trying to cheer up Kyle. He had noticed that he hadn’t seen Kyle laugh or smile in a few days at least, and he was determined to change that.  
“Kenny said he saw Wendy chewing Stan out today, for what it’s worth,” Cartman decided to say. Kyle turned to look in surprise at him.  
“Really?” he asked. “How did he take it?”  
“I don’t know,” Cartman replied. “Kenny said he just kind of stormed off afterwards. So, I’m guessing he didn’t take it well. I think she got through to him.”  
“I hope so,” Kyle sighed. “Because all of this is driving me insane. I haven’t been able to sleep for two or three days now.” Cartman tried to not look guilty, since that had partly been his fault, but his smile did drop a bit.  
“So,” he said, deciding to change topics. “Do you think your parents are done watching Fifty Shades of Grey yet?”  
“I don’t know,” Kyle replied, pulling out his phone and beginning to dial a number. “Let me just call Ike and check.” Cartman blinked in surprise at him as Kyle listened into the phone for a moment. “Hey Ike, how are mom and dad doing?”  
Kyle didn’t have the speaker phone on, but Cartman could clearly hear his brother as if he was in the same room as them. “HELP ME!” they both heard him scream on the other side.  
“Ok,” Kyle muttered, nonchalantly hanging up on him before turning to Cartman. “Yeah, they’re still not done.” Cartman continued to stare at him in shock.  
“You left your baby brother there with them?” he asked in astonishment. Kyle shrugged like it was no big deal.  
“He knows all about that stuff already, and I warned him what our parents were up to,” he explained. “It’s his own fault, really.”  
They sat there in silence for another moment before an idea suddenly popped into Cartman’s head. “I have an idea,” he said, standing up. “I’ll be right back.” Then he quickly raced out of the room. Kyle let out a sigh and pulled out his phone again, texting Kenny when another tweet popped up on the side. He frowned at it and continued with his text. Another one popped up. Stan was doing this on purpose. He wasn’t just responding to his girlfriend’s tweets, he was doing it just to torment him, he just knew it.  
He was caught off guard when Cartman suddenly slammed down a stack of movies in front of him. He eyed the stack wearily as Cartman sat down next to him, sinking in the couch so much that it slid Kyle into him.  
“Why do you have so many romantic comedies?” Kyle asked after a moment of reading the titles.  
“I swear they’re all my mom’s,” Cartman said quickly.  
“Uh-huh,” Kyle replied, unconvinced. “So, why did you bring them out here?”  
“Well, remember that time the four of us saw that stupid romantic comedy in like the first grade for some reason and we just sat there and made fun of it?” Cartman asked him.  
“Sort of,” he muttered.  
“Well, my mom has all of these stupid romance movies, so I thought it would be fun to sit here and make fun of them,” Cartman concluded. Kyle looked less than convinced about that, but he shrugged anyways.  
“Yeah, sure, why not?” he said. Cartman smiled and stood again.  
“Great! I’m gonna go make popcorn!” then he raced out of the room again. When he came back with a large bowl that was obviously filled with at least two bags of popcorn, Cartman was slightly annoyed to see Kyle staring down at his phone again.  
“You know, staring at the screen like that isn’t going to make the problem go away,” he pointed out, sitting down next to him. Kyle rolled his eyes.  
“I don’t need you to tell me that, you know,” he growled at him. Cartman frowned and snatched his phone out of his hand before tossing it across the room. Kyle glared at him and Cartman gave him a look as if daring him to try and retrieve it. After a moment of glaring at him, Kyle gave up and sat back into the couch, folding his arms crossly.  
The two of them then took a few moments to read aloud the backs of the DVD covers in cheesy, over the top voices before picking a movie to watch. They eventually settled on a movie called “IQ,” because the author of this fan fiction hated that movie with a burning passion and looked for any chance to bash it, including putting up her own mocking fan fiction of it on fanfiction.net (which you should totally go read, by the way).  
“Oh god,” Kyle said, looking at the back of the cover. “This movie has Meg Ryan in it.”  
“This ought to be good then,” Cartman replied, getting the movie set up.  
“Aw man,” Kyle groaned suddenly, still looking at the back. “They dragged poor Walter Matthau into this, didn’t they?”  
The moment the movie started playing, they could immediately tell that it was going to be a special kind of painful. It was abundantly clear that it was going to be the most cliché plot that happens in a romantic comedy, with terrible characters and trying to put Albert Einstein into it just so it wouldn’t look so generic and attempt to stand out. And then the movie had the gall to drag Tony Shalhoub and Stephen Fry down with it.  
“How long is this movie again?” Kyle asked, staring in disbelief at the screen.  
“Ninety-five minutes,” Cartman replied, looking at the cover. Kyle let out a groan in response, and Cartman couldn’t help pressing comfortingly against him.  
Then they got to the scene where Stephen Fry’s character, the fiancé, was asking Meg Ryan’s character which color she liked best because he was making a house for her. She responded with the stupidest, doesn’t connect in anyway sentence.  
“Who the fuck cares if there’s no color on the subatomic plane?” Kyle growled. “Sure, it’s kind of interesting, but how would that in any way help you through life?” Cartman just burst out laughing.  
After the scene where they introduce the love interest who was supposed to be charming and likeable and instead just came off as looking like a douche, Kyle spoke up again.  
“Is it just me, or is the fiancé who’s supposed to be stuck up and rude the most likeable character in this movie?” he asked, turning to look at Cartman.  
“Yeah,” Cartman agreed, quickly turning his eyes back to the screen. “It’s like they think that just because he’s the fiancé, that automatically makes him a terrible person.”  
“And seriously?” Kyle ranted, gesturing towards the screen. “They think that Albert Einstein would think a car mechanic would be better suited for his nonexistent niece than her fiancé whom she probably is engaged to for a good reason?”  
“Oh, it gets better,” Cartman told him with a smile. “Trust me.”  
“I can’t trust you when you smile like that,” he confessed. That just made his grin spread even wider. If only just to hide the fact that he was fighting the urge to just lean over and start making out with Kyle right then and there.  
The two of them yelled at the screen when the stupid plot point of Einstein trying to make the romantic interest appear intelligent to impress the main character.  
“Yeah, he’s perfect for her,” Cartman sighed, rolling his eyes. “He just has to change everything about himself except his looks, but yeah, he’s totally a better for her than her actual fiancé.”  
“Are they seriously now trying to justify that the fiancé is the antagonist just because he wouldn’t have sex with her at a dinner party at someone else’s house?” Kyle asked, a look of disgust on his face.  
“Of course!” Cartman said sarcastically, looking at him with wide eyes. “Don’t you know? When your wife wants to have sex with you, you fucking do it! Even if it’s in the lobby of someone else’s house? Don’t you know how the world works?”  
“You would have sex with Meg Ryan?” Kyle asked him, cocking an eyebrow. Cartman scoffed at him.  
“Oh god no,” he replied. “Even if I was married to her.” Kyle rolled his eyes, but Cartman managed to catch the corner of his mouth forming into a slight grin. God, he really wanted to kiss that mouth.  
“Well, that was the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen,” Kyle muttered when the credits finally started to roll. “So, now what?”  
“What about Mamma Mia?” Cartman asked, holding up the DVD case. “And Old Fashioned? Or Letter to Santa? Oh, there’s also…”  
“Ok, seriously, Cartman,” Kyle interrupted, looking at him in surprise. “How many of these things do you own?”  
Cartman paused for a moment. “I told you, they belong to my mom,” he muttered.  
Kyle blinked at him. “Is your mom ever going to come home?” he asked.  
“Probably not,” Cartman replied nonchalantly.  
Cartman quickly ran over and popped another random movie in before Kyle could protest, and when he sat down next to him, he noticed Kyle eying the area where his phone had been tossed. He gave his friend a hard stare, causing Kyle to sigh.  
“I really should call my parents to see if they want me home yet,” he pointed out.  
“Go over there and I’ll bite your hand off,” was Cartman’s only reply. Kyle glared at him for a moment before sitting back, pulling his legs up to his chest once more.  
They watched through all of Mamma Mia, making fun of every part of it, and then they watched Old Fashioned, but they only got a fourth of the third movie before they both fell asleep on the couch. In his last moment before he dozed off, Cartman thought about how he was glad it was Friday, so he didn’t have to awkwardly explain why he and Kyle would have arrived at the bus stop together again the next day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m going to end this chapter here because it’s gone on too long and honestly, I’ve rambled on enough. Again, I really hate the movie IQ, and the only good things are Tony Shalhoub and Stephen Fry. I love them. I just wish they weren’t in this movie. It has every single romance cliché that I hate, and then make Stephen Fry’s character look like the villain. It’s the worst. So yeah, not a big fan.  
> Anyways, if you read this, trying leaving a review! That would be fun! Tell me what you think! And as always, I’ll see you in the next chapter. And don’t forget to forgive your enemies. Nothing annoys them more.


	13. Shit Finally Goes Down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, Chapter 13, yo! That’s officially half way through this fan fiction! Yay!  
> Anyways, this is where the plot really gets going, if it hasn’t already. And that’s all I’ve got. Except that I’m also typing a sequel to this story as we speak. So, that will be fun.
> 
> “We’ll be running down the street yelling ‘Kiss my ass!’”

When Monday rolled around, nobody was quite sure what the atmosphere would be like at the school. At the bus stop, the four boys stood noticeably apart from each other, refusing to speak to one another, and the bus was rather quiet on the way to school. Angela seemed to be the only one who had any sort of hint of a smile, and she wore it smugly on her face.  
As they sat there and said absolutely nothing, Kenny decided to break the silence with Kyle, Cartman and himself.  
“So, did you guys ever decide on a theme for that stupid dance?” he asked casually. His two friends exchanged glances before answering.  
“Um, sort of,” Kyle muttered.  
“Really?” Kenny wondered. “What did you pick?”  
“Do you think Stan’s ever going to talk to us again?” Cartman asked instead of answering the question. “I mean, I sort of get why he’s mad at Kyle, but why is he so mad at the two of us? We haven’t done anything.”  
Kyle cast a sideways glare at him, but didn’t say anything as Kenny just stared with slight annoyance at how they just avoided answering his question. Knowing that he wasn’t going to get an answer, he decided to change the topic.  
“So, how long were your parents at it on Friday?” he asked Kyle. His friend shrugged.  
“I don’t know,” he replied. “They were fast asleep on the couch when I came home in the morning. And Ike was hiding in the corner of the kitchen.”  
“Did you get in trouble?” Cartman wondered.  
“I don’t even think they knew I snuck out,” Kyle told him with a sigh.  
The morning started out normal enough, with Mr. Garrison babbling on about nothing for a couple hours before the lunch bell finally rang. What had really gotten on their nerves was the fact that now Stan and Angela basically had a lunch table all to themselves. The two barely ate, they just instead laughed and flirted with each other. As they sat down with Craig and his friends, Kenny glanced over at them before turning to his two friends.  
“Does anyone have any ibuprofen?” he asked, rubbing his temples. “Just watching those two is giving me a headache.”  
Immediately and without saying anything, Kyle reached into his bag and brought out a huge bottle of ibuprofen. He reached over and took Kenny’s hand, flipping it with his palm up, before just pouring a pile of the pills into his hand. Kenny stared at it for a moment, shrugged, then attempted to shove all of them into his own face.  
Skeptical, Craig glanced over at them, about to state that it couldn’t possibly be that bad, but then caught sight of Stan and Angela flirting. He thought it over for a moment, then reached out his own hand, into which more ibuprofen was poured.  
The rest of the day carried on normally, and it wasn’t until school was finally over did all hell finally break lose. Kyle stood at his locker, putting his books away, when Kenny and Cartman made their way over to him.  
“Dude, you want to hang out tonight?” Kenny asked him. Kyle gave a noncommittal shrug in response.  
“Sure,” he replied. “What are we doing?”  
“Well, first we have to go to the supermarket,” Cartman said before Kenny could reply. “I promised my mom that I would pick up more Valentine candy on the way home.” Kyle blinked at him.  
“You already bought more on Saturday,” he pointed out. “I remember, I was with you when that happened.” Cartman just gave him a blank stare before replying.  
“Yeah,” he said. “But that’s all gone now.”  
Kyle rolled his eyes and sighed, but before he could respond, he saw Stan and Angela rounding the corner at the end of the hallway. They were talking about something, and he noticed Angela glance in their direction. As soon as she spotted Kyle, she suddenly grabbed Stan’s shoulders, making him drop his books, lean forward and kiss him deeply. Stan looked surprised at first, but then he leaned into the kiss eagerly.  
Kyle couldn’t help but narrow his eyes at the sight, and out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that Cartman, for some reason, was also seething with rage. Kenny just looked completely annoyed. Kyle had half a mind to just turn back to his locker and ignore them, but at that moment, someone quickly slammed into his side, nearly knocking him over. Confused, he turned and just barely managed to catch sight of Wendy before she hurried around the corner.  
Not really thinking, Kyle quickly dropped everything and ran after her. Cartman and Kenny turned to watch bewildered before hurrying to catch up with them. Wendy was practically knocking down everyone in her path in her attempt to get away, and the three friends quickly weaved through the crowd of kids to follow her.  
Wendy ran down the hall blindly, tears streaming down her face as she stared down at the floor, trying to hide her face from anyone she passed. When she found a hallway with less people, she spotted a nearby janitor’s closet and quickly ran into it. She quickly slammed the door behind her, ran over to a corner, sat down and sobbed. She pulled her knees up to her chest and rested her head into them, sobbing like a three-year-old. She knew she shouldn’t take this so badly, but she couldn’t help it. She didn’t care that she had been the one to break up with him and that they had been apart for long enough that he could start dating again. She didn’t care that he was happy now. She didn’t care that she should have moved on by now. She just wanted to stay here until the end of time and cry.  
Perhaps she had been sobbing so loudly that they had heard her, or maybe she didn’t hear them when they followed her, but she was startled when she felt someone sit down next to her, and even more startled when she saw that it was Kyle, Kenny and Cartman. Kyle and Kenny sat down on either side of her, pressing against her comfortingly, while Cartman sat down in front of her. Immediately she knew that they had seen her break down and she knew why they were here now.  
“Guys, I’ll be fine,” she tried to say through her sobs. “I’m just a little upset.”  
Not a single one of them was fooled by this. “Come on, Wendy,” Kenny said. “Even Cartman can tell that you’re not fine. And he’s an idiot.”  
“I know,” she sighed as Cartman glared at him. “I just don’t know what to do. I mean, I should be happy for him, but she even asked me if we had dated before saying that she was going out with him. It was like she just wanted to make sure that she would make my life miserable before she went out with him.”  
Kyle couldn’t help but put an arm around her shoulders as she wept. “It’s going to be ok,” he assured her. “We’re not going to let her get away with this.”  
“Yeah,” Cartman agreed. “That bitch is going down. Especially if we have anything to say about this. And we do.”  
“Besides,” Kyle added. “They’re not going to last. And not just because we’re going to meddle in it. That Angela is a lying bitch. Her relationship with Stan is based on lies and deceit. He’ll come around.”  
“I just want to be alone,” Wendy mumbled into her legs.  
“Well, too bad,” Kenny said. “Because we’re not leaving.”  
“I don’t want to deal with this right now,” she sobbed, ignoring him. “I just want to stay in here and think about things. And I want to be alone.” The three of them exchanged a glance, before looking over at her once more. Wendy wasn’t crying quite as hard anymore, but her breaths still came out with shuddering gasps, and she refused to look at any of them.  
“Come on, Wendy,” Cartman said gently. “You’re not going to make things better by just hiding in here for the rest of your life. Sometimes, you just got to take a chance and hope it works out. You can either choose to live in denial, or you can do something about it. If you love him, he’ll see that eventually.”  
Kyle and Kenny stared in surprise at Cartman’s words, as if they couldn’t believe that this was the same person as the Cartman that they walked in here with.  
“C-Cartman’s right,” Kenny stuttered after a moment. “And right now, you need to take a step back and get your mind off things. You need to do something fun once in a while.”  
“Like what?” Wendy asked, tilting her head slightly to look at him.  
“Well, you could hang out with us,” Kyle invited. “We were planning on hanging out today, but you can totally join us.”  
“Just don’t expect us to do anything too girly,” Kenny warned. Wendy thought it over for a moment before letting out a long sigh.  
“I don’t know, you guys,” she said at last. “I think I’m just going to go home and…” she was cut off when, after exchanging a look with the other two, Cartman suddenly stood and hoisted her into his arms and carried her out of the closet with Kenny and Kyle quickly following him. She yelled at him to put her down, but she was ignored.  
The four of them came back the way they came, which unfortunately meant they had to make their way past Stan and Angela. They quickly passed them one by one, and Stan pulled away from Angela to stare in confusion when Cartman walked past him carrying Wendy in his arms. Kenny didn’t look at either of them as he walked past, and as Kyle strode past them, Stan was annoyed to see that his arm was extended towards them, casually giving them both the middle finger with the same deadpan look that Craig usually gave.  
Angela glared after them, but she forced herself to smile and look confused when she turned back to Stan. “Well, it looks like Wendy’s moving on,” she said. “That’s nice to know.” Stan opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted by Angela leaning forward and kissing him again, driving any other thought from his mind.  
Once they were outside, Cartman finally put Wendy back on her feet. She thought about just leaving right then, but she had to admit it was really sweet of Stan’s friends to try to cheer her up, so she decided to take them up on their offer of hanging out with them.  
Since Cartman insisted on getting that candy, they made their way over to the supermarket as their first stop. The store was obnoxiously decorated with red and pink, and it clashed with the bright green in one of the corners for St. Patrick’s Day, and the pastel colors in the other corner for early Easter. Thankfully, there wasn’t that many people there, since it was a week day, and they had just gotten out of school.  
Cartman determinedly led the way down the aisles towards the seasonal section, which they only recognized because it was more obnoxiously decorated than the rest of the store. Wendy pressed herself against Kyle and stared at the ground as they walked, determined not to look at any of the decorations.  
“How many bags of candy did your mother want you to get?” Kenny wondered as Cartman just started piling bags into the blonde’s arms.  
“Oh, I don’t know,” Cartman said nonchalantly. “I think she said like two or three.”  
“You’ve got five bags now,” Kyle pointed out.  
“Yup.”  
“So, what are we going to do now?” Wendy asked when they left the store five minutes later. The three boys exchanged glances, having no idea how to answer that question. They had rarely ever had a girl in their group, let alone hang out with one, and none of them really had any idea what sort of things you could do with one girl and three guys.  
“Well, my mom bought Ike a Wii a couple months ago,” Kyle said after a moment. “She wanted him to play more age appropriate games, so she got him stuff like Mario Kart and Mario Party and stuff like that.”  
“That sounds like that could be worth a few shits and giggles,” Kenny replied. “But won’t your brother be mad if we just took over his games?”  
“Nah,” Kyle replied. “He doesn’t actually use it. He usually just sneaks into my room and plays Call of Duty instead.”  
“Ok, let’s do it,” Wendy agreed.  
The four of them made their way over to Kyle’s house, and he was glad to see that his parents weren’t home yet, so he didn’t have to awkwardly explain anything to them just yet. Kyle quickly went up to his brother’s room to grab the Wii, leaving his friends to just sit there awkwardly for a couple minutes.  
Wendy’s tears had finally managed to dry, and when Kyle came back downstairs, she looked super pumped to beat them all in the Mario games.  
“Ok, but I have to warn you, I’m a wiz at Mario Kart,” Kenny said, puffing out his chest.  
“Have you ever played Mario Kart?” Cartman wondered, but Kenny merely glared at him and didn’t give him a response.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m going to end the chapter right there. In the next chapter, there’s going to be some interesting developments, so look forward to that. This chapter isn’t as funny as the rest of the story, but it really wasn’t supposed to, so I hope that doesn’t throw any of you off or anything. Any ways, tell me what you think of the story, tell me if you have any predictions or anything and remember that the Hokey Pokey Clinic is a place to turn yourself around.


	14. I Knew You Were Trouble When You Walked In

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I’ve really got nothing to say. I’m dropping in the time it takes me to post new chapters mostly because I don’t want to neglect my other stories, and I also have to catch up on schoolwork and stuff like that. So, yeah, there’s that.
> 
> “I’m like yeah, whatever, we’re still living like that!”

“Man,” Wendy laughed as she won another gold trophy in Mario Kart. “Are you guys even trying? This is too easy!”  
“If we say we let you win to make you feel better, can we still keep our dignity?” Kenny asked, throwing his control down in defeat.  
“Maybe,” Wendy said, smiling down at him. Kenny rolled his eyes at her but didn’t reply. They had been playing Mario Kart for about an hour now, and the three of them were relieved to see that Wendy’s tears had stopped, as she became too caught up in beating them all at Mario Kart.  
“Come on, Kenny,” Cartman said sarcastically. “I thought you said you were a master at Mario Kart.” Kenny glared at him.  
“Shut up,” he growled.  
“You guys want to try a different game?” Kyle asked with an amused grin.  
“Yeah, sure,” Cartman agreed. “It’s not like we have homework or anything.”  
“We do have homework,” Wendy pointed out.  
“Yeah, but’s not like I’m gonna actually do it,” Cartman told her.  
They played Mario Party next, and had to listen to a ten-minute rant from Kenny about how Donkey Kong stopped being a playable character after Mario Party 4, and how stupid that was, which was only matched by his previous rant about slowly replacing all of the characters in the racing games with babies.  
It wasn’t until near dinner time when Kyle’s parents finally returned home and Kyle forced everyone to leave. Before she left though, Wendy turned and trapped Kyle into a tight hug.  
“Thanks, Kyle,” she said, wrapping her arms around him. “It was really sweet of you and the guys to cheer me up. I’m sorry for troubling you guys.”  
Kyle, taken completely off guard by the hug, hesitated for a moment before answering.  
“Sure, Wendy,” he muttered. “I mean, what are friends for?”  
Wendy smiled and kissed him lightly on the cheek before turning and leaving. Kyle just stood there for a moment before sighing and making his way back to the living room.  
“I didn’t know you were dating Wendy now,” his mom said from behind him, startling him. He rolled his eyes, glad that she couldn’t see him do so.  
“We’re not dating, mom,” he pointed out to her. “I would never date my best friend’s ex. Even if we are fighting at the moment.” His mother made a rather disappointed “oh,” and left the room before Kyle could ask her what the hell that was supposed to mean.  
The next morning, Wendy felt in much higher spirits, though she had to make a point to not even sort of glance in Angela’s direction, otherwise she was afraid that she would fall into despair all over again.  
“Hey Wendy,” Bebe greeted when she sat down next to her on the bus. “How come you weren’t at cheerleading practice? We were all worried about you.”  
“I’m sorry, Bebe,” Wendy replied, trying to look nonchalant about it. “I just had something personal to deal with and I completely forgot about it. Did anything interesting happen?”  
“Not really,” Bebe told her. She gave her friend an odd look before continuing. “Red told me she saw you crying after Stan and Angela kissed. Is that why you couldn’t make it?”  
Wendy froze for a moment. Why did she have to bring that up? Should she lie about it and say she had no idea what she was talking about? Something told her that wouldn’t work on Bebe. She let out a long sigh before answering.  
“I just got upset is all,” she said. “But I’m better now.” Bebe didn’t look too convinced. “Honestly! I’m ok!”  
When they got to school, however, Wendy made sure to stay close to her friends, keeping a barrier around herself so that she wouldn’t have to see Angela or Stan.  
Kenny, Kyle and Cartman, however, were actively discussing what they were going to do about the situation. It was sort of hard to do, since it seemed like Angela was determined to just keep Stan’s friends as far away from him as possible. It was like she was poisoning his mind somehow.  
“I’m only ninety percent certain she’s not really a witch and she cast a spell on him or something,” Cartman commented, glancing over at the two of them when they sat down for lunch.  
“How can Stan not even feel the tiniest bit guilty about abandoning us like this?” Kenny growled, glaring over at them.  
Kyle was about to reply, but then Angela leaned over and began making out with Stan. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Wendy freeze as she was walking over to their table, having spotted the couple. She was having a better time than yesterday in trying to keep it together, but he could see that tears were starting to come to her eyes.  
“Ok, that’s it,” Kyle growled, slamming his fists on the table and standing up. Cartman and Kenny both stared in shock as he angrily stormed to the other side of the cafeteria. He walked up to Stan and tapped him on the shoulder. “Stan, I need to talk to you privately.”  
“No,” Stan growled at him. “Fuck off.” He turned back to Angela as Kyle frowned at him. Before he could continue his conversation with her, however, Kyle grabbed him by the ear and started dragging him out of the cafeteria. People stopped and stared as he dragged him through the hall before stopping at a closet and roughly shoving his friend in and following him. Stan spun around and glared at him, rubbing his sore ear as Kyle closed the door and turned to him, leaning against it.  
“Let me out of here, Kyle,” Stan ordered him with a snarl. Kyle simply folded his arms in reply. “I said let me out! What’s wrong with you?”  
“What’s wrong with you?” Kyle snapped at him. “How can you possibly believe the girl you barely know over your own friends? I know you won’t believe that she kissed me, but have you stopped to think that maybe she was lying as well?”  
“I don’t need a lecture from you as well,” Stan growled.  
“Well, apparently you do,” he replied. “Would you have believed Angela if I had come to you first instead of her? Or if I had told you about any of the flirting she had done before that moment?” Stan opened his mouth to reply, but froze, not knowing how to respond. Kyle raised an eyebrow at him, waiting for him to answer.  
“If she had been flirting with you, why didn’t you just tell me?” Stan asked eventually. His friend let out a sigh.  
“Because I didn’t want to ruin your first relationship since Wendy,” he replied. “And because I was afraid you wouldn’t believe me. I was hoping to talk her about it, but then all of this bullshit happened.” Stan narrowed his eyes at him. “Look, I’m not expecting you to believe me or anything, I just want you to not take it out on Kenny, Cartman and Wendy.”  
Stan blinked in shock at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he muttered, looking down at the floor. Kyle rolled his eyes in response.  
“You do too,” he replied. “You didn’t have to shout at Kenny when he was trying to defend me, you know. Or Cartman.”  
“Fine, I get it,” Stan replied, visibly becoming calmer at last. Kyle let out a sigh of relief.  
“And I wouldn’t make out with Angela when Wendy’s around anymore,” he warned him. “You might not think so, but she’s not as over your break up as you may believe.”  
Finally, Kyle moved aside and let the door swing open. Stan stood there for a moment before starting to make his way out the door. He paused for a moment as he roughly brushed past Kyle.  
“I still don’t trust you,” he hissed at him. Then he made his way out into the hallway and hurried back towards the cafeteria before his friend could reply, leaving Kyle to glare after him.

Stan had never felt so confused in his entire life. He wanted to trust Kyle. He wanted to believe him and his friends. But he didn’t want to believe that Angela really had kissed his best friend and was just using him to get to Kyle. It would mean that she didn’t really love him at all like the way he did.  
And he was completely taken off guard by the last thing Kyle had said. Wendy still had feelings for him? He thought she didn’t care or had already moved on. She had broken up with him, after all. It made no sense to him.  
He didn’t pay attention to really anything for the rest of the day, even to Angela when she talked to him. After school, he was putting his things back into his locker, when he noticed his three friends and Wendy walk by him, talking and laughing with one another. He stared after them for a moment, letting out a sigh. He had to admit, it was getting kind of lonely with only Angela to talk to. Maybe he shouldn’t have alienated his friends like that.  
With a sigh, he found himself making his way to the guidance councilor’s office. He already knew that Mr. Mackey wasn’t there, since Cartman had told him a long time ago, but he still felt like he needed a little guidance at the moment. Cartman had described in great detail the terrifyingness of Dr. Pidd, but it still didn’t prepare him for the scariest looking smile and set of teeth he had ever seen when he walked in. Just one look at her made him believe that the theme from Psycho should follow her everywhere she went.  
“Um, hi,” Stan greeted, taking a step back nervously. “I-I’m…”  
“Stan Marsh!” Dr. Pidd interrupted, standing up to greet him. “Yes! I’ve heard a lot about you, you know! Come on in! What can I do for you?”  
Immediately Stan had second thoughts about confiding in this lady, but his mouth apparently didn’t agree with his brain, because it was already telling Dr. Pidd all of his worries and problems and the dilemma he had been going through. Dr. Pidd listened carefully, keeping the same, creepy smile on her face the entire time. She hesitated for a moment when he finished his story, thinking it over for a moment.  
“And now you want to kill your best friend?” she asked in a way as if she was asking a dog to do a trick for her. Stan blinked in confusion at her.  
“What? No, of course not!” he replied after a moment. “I never said that!”  
“Look, Stan,” she said as if he hadn’t said anything. “I know it’s natural to be jealous or angry, but that’s not worth going down a violent path for. I mean, I would understand if you did want to hurt him in some way, but you’d have to cover your tracks to do it.”  
There was a long pause before Stan spoke again.  
“Are you trying to suggest that try to kill my best friend just because the girl I’m dating might like him more than me?” he asked her hesitantly.  
“No! Of course not!” Dr. Pidd replied, winking repeatedly at him. “Violence is never the answer. You just have to confront your problem head on! Metaphorically, of course. Do you understand?”  
“Not even sort of,” Stan replied. He let out a long sigh and looked at the ground. “I just want to know, am I overreacting to all of this?”  
“Of course not, sweetie,” she told him. “Everything you’re feeling is perfectly natural. After all, why would your new girlfriend screw everything up with you by kissing your best friend? That’s just silly!”  
Stan was about to remind her that he already told her why Angela would sabotage their relationship, but he was interrupted by Dr. Pidd quickly saying that that was all the time she had for him and quickly shoved him out of her office. He was startled to see Clyde standing on the other side of the hallway, staring at him.  
“What are you doing here?” Stan asked, trying not to sound nervous. Clyde blinked at him.  
“I got detention,” he replied simply. “What’s up with you?”  
“I was just, er, getting some advice,” Stan mumbled. Clyde shrugged and started to walk away, before Stan quickly stopped him again. “Clyde, do you think I’m overreacting? Do you think I’m being used?”  
“Did she tell you were overreacting?” Clyde asked, looking past him and nodding at the room he had just left. Stan blinked at him.  
“No,” he replied.  
“Then you probably are,” Clyde said. Stan couldn’t help but stare at him for his answer.  
“What makes you say that?” he asked him.  
“Because I’ve been forced to see her already,” Clyde answered. “She’s absolutely insane.” Stan waited for him to explain. He let out a sigh. “She suggested that I violently stab Tweek to death,” he said eventually. Stan stared in shock at him, but Clyde didn’t give him an explanation for this and instead just turned and continued down the hall, leaving Stan to just stare after him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, as much as I want to continue on with this chapter, I’ve pretty much accomplished everything I wanted to do. So, I’ll end it here. Otherwise, I’d just go on to babble on and on. Next chapter is going to be pretty fun, and it’s the last chapter before the Valentine’s Day carnival (oh yeah, I forgot that was a thing). That will be fun. And awkward. But mostly awkward. Don’t forget to leave a review! And remember, an apple a day will keep anyone away if you throw it hard enough!


	15. Kenny Finally Does Something About it

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can’t remember if I mentioned this or not (and am too lazy to pull up the previous chapters and check), but I’m planning a sequel for this story, where it’s going to take place four years later. So, that will be fun! I’m typing it right now! I might have already said that! Anyways, here’s the next chapter.
> 
> “When the sun’s going down, we’ll be raising our cups, singing ‘Here’s to never growing up!’”

The next day at lunch, all of the boys were sitting at one table, silently eating and barely looking at each other. Clyde was the last one to join them, and as soon as he sat down, he looked down the table at Kyle, Kenny and Cartman.  
“Did you know Stan was at the guidance counselor yesterday?” he asked casually. Kyle and Kenny exchanged glances while Cartman choked slightly on his food.  
“Um, what did they talk about?” he asked Clyde, trying to keep the nervousness out of his voice. Clyde shrugged his shoulders.  
“Oh, I don’t know,” he replied. “He didn’t really tell me. It sounded like whatever she told him he was taking seriously, though. I have no idea why.”  
“Yeah, that woman is crazy,” Craig agreed, not even looking up.  
“Why?” Kenny wondered. “What’s she been telling you guys?” Clyde and Craig’s eyes widened as they stared at him, but neither of them spoke. Kenny stared back at them. “So…what did she tell you…?”  
“She suggested to me that I should try and kill everyone in the whole world,” Tweek blurted out suddenly. “I mean, who does that?!?”  
“SHE TOLD YOU THAT TOO!?!” Cartman shouted, staring at Tweek with wide eyes. The others stared at him for a moment before he sat back down. “I mean, what a lunatic…” he mumbled.  
“Oh, is that why she was trying to hint that I should set my girlfriend on fire,” Token muttered under his breath.  
“Ok, seriously?” Kenny said before anyone could ask Token why she had suggested that. “Is there anyone here who hasn’t gotten crazy advice from this Dr. Pidd?”  
“I haven’t,” Kyle pointed out, resting his head on his fist. “But then again I haven’t done anything that has forced me to see her.”  
“I don’t even think any of the girls have not seen Dr. Pidd,” Butters pointed out nervously. “At least, that’s what Wendy said at our last meeting. Even she and Angela have been to see that crazy doctor.”  
Kenny immediately straightened up at this news. “They have?” he asked. “Well, that’s interesting…”  
Kyle gave him a confused look as Kenny stared down at the table in contemplation. “What are you thinking?” he asked him in a low voice so the others couldn’t hear.  
“I don’t know yet,” Kenny replied.

The rest of school passed rather uneventfully. A bunch of pirates had suddenly burst into the classroom and kidnapped Mr. Garrison, and then a bunch of space bunnies came out of nowhere and got into an epic sword fight with the pirates until they decided to join forces and rule the cosmos together before flying away and returned Mr. Garrison because they found him too annoying. So again, rather uneventful.  
After that rather boring class, Kenny stood at his locker, putting stuff away when he heard his name being called, and he turned to see Kyle and Cartman making their way towards him.  
“Hey dude,” Kyle greeted him. “You wanna hang out tonight?”  
Kenny was tempted to say yes, but he remembered the plan that for some reason he didn’t want to tell his friends about. It was going to be dangerous, but he had to do something about the growing situation.  
“Sorry,” he replied. “I have something I need to take care of.”  
“Are you sure?” Cartman asked. “We were going to go to the store to get more candy.” Immediately, before Kenny could reply, Kyle let out a groan of annoyance.  
“Oh, Cartman,” he sighed. “Again?” Cartman blinked at him.  
“I ran out…” he mumbled.  
“I’m sure,” Kenny replied before Kyle could comment. “It’s really important.”  
“Well, I guess it’ll just be you, me and Wendy then,” Kyle said, turning to Cartman.  
“Wait…Wendy’s coming with us?” he asked nervously. Kyle gave him an annoyed look.  
“Yes,” he hissed at him. “She asked us this morning if she could hang out with us, remember?”  
“No,” Cartman muttered.  
“You were the one who said it was ok,” Kyle reminded him.  
“I don’t recall ever saying that.”  
“Ok, I’ll see you guys later,” Kenny said before the argument could escalate. “Say hi to Wendy for me.” Then he turned and quickly walked away.  
Kenny had a feeling that whatever was going on in Angela’s head and whatever was happening at the school had something to do with this Dr. Pidd. After he had spent all class thinking about it, he had realized that Cartman hadn’t started acting weird until he had seen Dr. Pidd, and knowing that Stan and Angela had also seen her sent up red flags in his head. He had to see what she was doing.  
He made his way over to her office and started to reach towards the door handle before stopping himself. She was probably still in there, and he couldn’t snoop through her office if that was the case. He could just walk in there claiming to need help, but he didn’t want to be brainwashed like the rest of his friends. And he couldn’t wait for her to leave for the day, she would lock her office and then he would never find out what was going on.  
Standing there, feeling completely hopeless, he didn’t know what to do until he saw Butters walking by out of the corner of his eye.  
“Hey Kenny!” Butters greeted.  
“Butters!” Kenny said, going over to him. “I need your help with something.”  
“Sure, what do you need?” Butters asked, stopping and staring at him.  
“I need you to distract Dr. Pidd out of her office for, like, fifteen minutes,” Kenny told him. Before Butters could ask why, he added, “No questions asked.” Butters hesitated for a moment before replying.  
“Well, ok,” he said uncertainly. “I’ll try.”  
Butters quickly ran over to the office and disappeared inside of it. Kenny hid behind a plant and waited quietly for them to come. A couple minutes later, Butters came out with Dr. Pidd right behind him.  
“And it’s, like, ten feet tall!” Butters was saying. “You just have to come and see it! It’s going to be great!”  
Kenny didn’t catch her answer because he was already slipping quietly inside the office and closing the door behind him. Even though she was only temporary, Dr. Pidd had rearranged the office dramatically, to the point that he couldn’t even tell that it was supposed to be Mr. Mackey’s office. Everything in the office was decorated with pink, which he figured was just to get into the Valentine’s Day mood, but it was still incredibly tacky.  
Not knowing exactly what he was looking for, he went over to her desk and tried the different drawers. Most of them were locked or had boring things in them. He let out a sigh before turning to the cabinets. Surprisingly, they were open. He pulled out one of the cabinet drawers and saw that they were organized from A to Z. Not really remembering Angela’s last name, he leafed through them one at a time until he found it. He paused for a moment to make sure that no one was coming before pulling out her file and going over to the desk to open it.  
Immediately he was bombarded with several notes that Pidd had written during her sessions, most of it in short hand, but it seemed to make some bit of sense. He leafed through the pages, not knowing if he was surprised or not by what he saw.  
Apparently, Angela had told Dr. Pidd that she had a crush on Kyle the first day she moved there. With growing anger, Kenny read the notes about how it had been her plan to use Stan to get closer to Kyle, and the crazy doctor not only encouraged it, but suggested a stupid rom com plot as a plan of action.  
“That son of a bitch!” Kenny hissed quietly to himself. He flipped the page, and saw a long conversation written down about the infamous incident that he had heard about, and this time he was definitely not surprised to see that Kyle had been right all along. After she had kissed him, Angela had gone to Dr. Pidd to talk about it, confessing to the crime, and wondering what she should do next. Dr. Pidd hadn’t written down her own answer, but it there was enough written down to suggest that the two of them had come up with the idea of lying to Stan.  
“I knew that bitch was lying,” Kenny growled under his breath. Quickly, he ripped the incriminating page out and stuffed in his pocket. Then he carefully put the folder back exactly as he had found it. Before he could close it, though, he spotted Cartman’s folder and immediately curiosity over took him and he pulled it out.  
The first thing Kenny saw was that apparently Dr. Pidd had recorded her entire first session with Cartman. He quickly leafed through the part where they recapped pretty much every episode, before he finally found what he was looking for. The reason why Cartman had been acting so incredibly weird.  
“Oh, there is no way he could possibly believe that,” Kenny muttered, trying to stop himself from smirking. “Is there?”  
What stopped him from leafing through and finding out was not the fact that invading his friend’s privacy was kind of morally wrong, but because he suddenly heard Butters’ voice slowly getting closer. In a panic, he quickly closed the file and tossed it back into the drawer before silently and carefully slipping out of the office, trying not to make the door move too much.  
He quickly made his way back home, shouted to his mom that he would be in his room, and quickly rushed over to the phone. Cartman didn’t pick up until the second time he dialed his number.  
“Oh, hey Kenny,” he greeted, sounding half asleep. “What’s up?”  
“Cartman, I have some big news,” Kenny told him. “Are you by yourself?”  
“Yeah, why?”  
“Well, you know how Angela claimed that Kyle kissed her?” Cartman told him to go on. “Well, I’ve got proof! Proof that Kyle was right all along!” There was a pause on the other end of the phone.  
“I know she kissed him,” Cartman said eventually. Kenny blinked in surprise.  
“How do you know?” he wondered. There was another long pause and for a moment Kenny thought that Cartman had hung up on him. He was almost startled when he heard him speak again.  
“I may have been there when it happened,” he revealed at last.  
“Why?” was the only thing Kenny managed to choke out.  
“Because,” Cartman growled. “We were working on that stupid dance, and at the end, Kyle asked to speak to that whore privately. He had already told us about how crazy she was, and I was curious about what was going on, so I might have been spying through the double doors.”  
Kenny couldn’t decide if he believed that reason or not, but at the moment, it didn’t really matter. “Well, why didn’t you say anything?” he wondered instead.  
“Because Jesus Christ, Kenny!” Cartman snapped. “You know Kyle and Stan both overreact to everything! I don’t need Kyle to know that I was spying on him, and you know Stan wouldn’t have believed me if I told him! Seriously, Kenny, think for a moment.”  
“Well, you have to say something,” Kenny pointed out, frowning. “It’s tearing our friendship apart!”  
“I thought you just said you have proof that she lied about everything,” Cartman reminded him. Kenny blinked.  
“Oh yeah,” he muttered. “I just don’t get the chance to get on a high horse very often.” He let out a sigh. “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow then. We’re going to finally take this bitch down.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yup. That’s a good place to stop. Sorry it has to end right there, but that’s the point of cliff hangers. Also, the next chapter is going to be the start of the carnival (finally!), which was the only thing anyone in school was looking forward to. Also, I have some plans for the next few chapters. Hilarious plans. Also, I will eventually explain why Dr. Pidd is so crazy, but that’s for the climax.  
> Anyways, tell me what you think and remember: When life gives you lemons, dance! Dance like there’s a muskrat in your pants!


	16. Are We Having Fun Yet?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoa! Kenny actually has proof that Angela’s a lying, cheating whore! Too bad something’s gonna go wrong! But, fortunately, some good stuff is going to happen in this chapter too. Like the fact that the carnival (you know, the thing I haven’t really been building up, but I’m going to say I have this entire time?) is finally going to happen, so that should be fun. Anyways, let’s get to it!
> 
> “We live like rock stars, dance on every bar…”

The next morning, Kenny stood waiting at his locker until Cartman finally arrived, looking as determined to end all this shit as he did.  
“Hey dude,” Cartman greeted quickly. “So, how did you get this dirt on Angela anyway?” Kenny hesitated for a moment, not quite sure if he should reveal the fact that he had snuck into Dr. Pidd’s office or not.  
“I may have snuck in somewhere,” he mumbled under his breath. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I have this paper here of her saying that she definitely kissed Kyle and not the other way around.” Cartman raised an eyebrow at him, immediately knowing that he had snuck into her office, but he didn’t say anything else.  
“So, are we gonna go tell Kyle?” he asked him after a moment. Kenny nodded.  
“And then we’ll show it to Stan,” he replied, pulling out the paper and showing it to him. “Hopefully he’ll believe this.”  
He shoved the paper back into his pocket, but before either of them could move, Angela walked by and roughly shoved past Kenny, pushing him into the lockers. She didn’t stop to look at them as she walked past, or even when Kenny growled at her to watch where she was going. Kenny glared after her, then quickly reached his hand into his pocket, feeling that the paper was still there. Good. That bitch.  
“Ok, let’s go,” he told Cartman. Kyle was also at his locker, pulling things out when they approached him. “Hey Kyle! Guess what!”  
“No,” Kyle answered, looking somewhat annoyed and immediately continuing to pull things from his locker. Kenny blinked at him.  
“We found proof that Angela’s been lying this entire time!” Cartman told him, smiling.  
“Really?” Kyle asked the same moment Kenny muttered “We?” under his breath. Cartman nudged the blonde in the side.  
“Show him, Kenny,” he said. Kenny glared at him, muttering “Don’t tell me what to do,” before pulling out the paper in his pocket and handing it to Kyle. Their friend glanced at it, but the unamused look on his face remained the same.  
“This is two-week old homework,” he announced. “And it’s not even yours.”  
Kenny’s eyes widened with surprise before he snatched the paper back from him and turning it over. Sure enough, it looked like math homework.  
“That son of a bitch!” he hissed, crumpling it up. “She must have swapped it out when she bumped into me!”  
“What a whore!” Cartman swore while Kyle just looked at the two confused. “Can I go chase her and beat her down?”  
“Ok, first of all, there’s no way you could catch her,” Kenny answered, rolling his eyes. “Second, she’s probably already gotten rid of the evidence. And third and most importantly, come on, dude, she would pound the fudge out of you.”  
Cartman glared at him and was about to reply, but was interrupted when Stan slowly shuffled up to them, looking kind of embarrassed.  
“Hey guys,” he muttered. None of them spoke, instead just staring at him in surprise. “I just wanted to apologize for how I’ve been acting. And I was hoping we could all hang out at the carnival tomorrow.”  
“Oh yeah,” Kenny said suddenly. “That was a thing, wasn’t it? Totally forgot about it.”  
“Why are you apologizing now of all times?” Cartman wondered, ignoring Kenny.  
“Because,” Stan sighed with a shrug. “I’ve just been doing a lot of thinking. And I think I’ve been hanging around Angela too much lately. I wanted to hang out with you guys.”  
Kyle didn’t speak, knowing that Stan was only talking to Cartman and Kenny, and he kept his eyes on the floor, deliberately keeping himself expressionless. He felt Cartman press lightly against him as Kenny awkwardly said that yeah, Stan could join them if he wanted. The moment he walked away, Kenny turned back to his friends.  
“Did that seem awkward to you?” he asked. “That seemed kind of awkward.”  
“Really?” Cartman growled, rolling his eyes. “What was your first clue?”  
“Are you sure that was a good idea?” Kyle asked suddenly, startling them both. “I don’t even think he’s aware of what he’s apologizing for. And it’s going to be incredibly awkward since he told me himself that he still doesn’t trust me.”  
“Well, maybe he’ll realize his mistake tomorrow,” Kenny said weakly, not even believing his own words. “Anyways, I’ll see you guys later. I gotta bitch that I need to choke.” Then he gathered up his things and walked off. Cartman glared after him.  
“Hey wait a minute!” he called, chasing after him. “Why do you get to kill her and I don’t?” Kyle stared after them for a moment before letting out a sigh and turning back to his locker. He really should have gotten better friends.

The greatest part about the carnival the next day was that everyone had the day off from school to go to it. No one was quite sure why that was, but no one was going to question it. Some of the adults and parents had come along as well for supervision, but every single one of them fell asleep as soon as they sat down in a nearby picnic area.  
Stan walked in with his dad and was glad to see that his friends were indeed waiting for him. They were sitting next to a fountain, talking quietly to each other when he made his way over, and they looked up when he approached.  
“There you are!” Kenny said, trying to be friendly. “We’ve been waiting here forever.”  
“Sorry,” Stan replied. “My dad took forever to get us over here because he started arguing with some guy on the phone or something.”  
“Well, what do you guys want to do first?” Kenny wondered, looking around. “I mean, we’ve got the entire day and we have to ride everything at least once, of course.”  
“Except for the stupid Tunnel of Love,” Cartman pointed out. “There’s no way in hell that we’re going to do that!”  
“Well, obviously,” Stan agreed. “Let’s do one of the roller coasters first! You know, start with something extreme?” Cartman grinned evilly.  
“I approve of this logic,” he said. “We need to do the wooden one first, though.”  
“Why?” Kyle wondered, speaking up for the first time.  
“Because if we do the best roller coaster first, then anything less will just pale in comparison,” Cartman told him as if it should have been obvious. “You’ve got to work your way up to the awesome coaster.” Kyle shrugged in response.  
“If you say so,” he said before getting up and leading the way down the path, leaving his friends to follow after him.  
Even though it wasn’t even noon yet, the carnival was already crowded with pretty much every kid from school. All the employees looked either disgruntled, or way too happy to be there. There was a long line up of booths with various carnival games, and another set of booths offering food, but the four of them ignored them all for now (although they did have to pull Cartman away from some of the food stands).  
The wooden roller coaster (which was called “Hard Wood” for some reason) sat near the edge of the carnival and was made up of many tall hills and twisting turns. There was even a spiral that went near the ground, but it seemed tiny compared to the “Iron Giant” roller coaster that sat in the middle of the carnival. Thankfully, that also meant that the line for it was much smaller. The only people that were in front of them were Token, Clyde and Craig (who looked like he couldn’t give two shits to being there).  
“Where’s Tweek?” Kenny asked as they walked up to them. “Isn’t he usually with you guys?”  
Without saying anything, and without the slightest change of expression, Craig pointed to a nearby bench where they saw their friend curled up on it with his knees to his chest, looking absolutely terrified. They couldn’t hear what he was muttering to himself, but they were pretty sure it was some paranoid thing about the roller coasters.  
They were let onto the ride by one of the workers who was way too happy to be there, there was a lengthy argument between Cartman, Clyde, Token and Kenny about who was sitting in the front (which was eventually won by Craig and Kyle who both just took the front car seats while they were arguing), and the coaster finally shot off.  
Exactly two minutes and thirty seconds later, the ride was over (one of them, probably Kenny, screamed like a girl the entire time), and they all made their way towards the exit, with the creepily happy employee wishing them a nice day.  
“Ok, now let’s pick a ride where Kenny won’t scream in my ear the entire time,” Stan growled, rubbing his sore ear. Kenny glared at him.  
“I didn’t scream the whole time,” he muttered under his breath. “That ride was painful.”  
“Yeah, I can see why they called it ‘Hard Wood’ now,” Cartman grumbled, rubbing his now sore back. “So, which one are we doing next?”  
As the three of them discussed which ride they were going to go to next, Kyle stood and watched as Craig and his friends went over to where Tweek was sitting. With absolutely no effort whatsoever, Craig scooped Tweek up and carried him off, and they made their way down the pathway. His eyes followed after them, and he suddenly froze when he saw Angela slowly walking towards them. She fortunately hadn’t seen them yet, but it wouldn’t take long before she did and tried to make things worse.  
“Let’s do that one!” Kyle blurted out, grabbing Stan’s shoulders and shoving him in the opposite direction. Kenny and Cartman blinked in surprise, exchanged confused glances, and had no choice but to follow their friends.  
The ride Kyle shoved Stan towards was a lot further away and they could barely see it from where they had been originally standing. The ride, called “Music Express,” was a large, circular ride with cars that could easily fit four or five people and was most famous for going really, really fast. It had a few hills around it, and it had loud music blaring in your ears. It had a “turbo” button that made the ride go so fast, it would nearly crush you with speed alone. It was also one of the author’s all-time favorite rides in a Pennsylvania theme park, so she just had to slip it into the story somewhere.  
As they approached the ride, they watched as it spun so fast that a kid was actually sent flying out of it (and they could have sworn they heard the kid shout “I don’t regret anything!” as he was sent soaring into the parking lot).  
“Woah,” was all any of them had to say about it.  
“Are you sure we should do this one now?” Kenny asked. “This one feels more like an ‘end of the day ride’ than a second ride, you know?”  
“It’s fine,” Kyle said dismissively as he continued to shove his friends towards the line. “We can’t do all of the boring rides first. We’ve gotta mix it up or none of the rides will feel as exciting or something.”  
“Didn’t we just go on an intense ride though?” Kenny replied. Kyle glared at him.  
“It wasn’t intense enough,” he said simply.  
“Wait!” Stan said suddenly, trying to dig his heels into the ground, trying and failing to halt their progress. “We can’t go on that one!”  
“Why not?” Cartman wondered, looking past him and at the line. “It’s just a bunch of girls standing in line. And Butters.”  
“Dude,” Stan hissed, pushing against Kyle but not even sort of slowing him down. “Wendy’s in the line! What if she sees me?”  
“Suck it up,” Kyle growled. Stan stared at him, clearly affronted, but didn’t get to say anything more as they reached the beginning of the line and Kyle shoved him through the ticket gate. Immediately, Wendy turned and spotted them.  
“Hi guys!” she greeted happily. Her eyes rested on Stan for a moment. “Where’s your girl… Where’s Angela?”  
“I don’t spend all of my time with her, you know,” Stan muttered, not sure what tone of voice to take with her. He noticed and for some reason really didn’t like the meaningful look that Wendy quickly exchanged with Kyle, but he decided not to comment on it. For the moment.  
They were all saved from having to make really awkward conversation by the ride ending and employees opening the gate to let them all in. The seats they picked had a huge warning sign stating that the smallest passengers had to sit on the inside while the biggest person had to sit on the outside.  
“Sorry Kenny,” Cartman said, in a monotone voice. “Looks like you’re sitting on the outside.” Kenny glared at him.  
“Yeah, there’s no way we’re letting you sit on the inside,” he growled at him.  
“Why not?” Cartman whined.  
“Because otherwise you would crush us to death as soon as the ride started,” Kyle pointed out calmly. Cartman stared at him for a moment before sitting down on the outside with a slight grumble. Kyle blinked in surprise at him before sighing and scrambling over him to sit down next to him, followed by Kenny and Stan.  
Cartman tried not to look nervous as Kyle was pressed against him. Or when the ride started and Kyle was really pressed against him. He had wanted to complain about how since all four of them sat together, then he would be the one would end up being crushed, but his mind kind of went blank whenever Kyle was pressed against him.  
Wendy, Bebe, Red and Heidi took the seat right in front of them, and they were infuriatingly whispering to each other so that Stan had no idea what they were saying. He wondered if they were talking about him, then he wondered why he should care. They were giggling quite a bit, but he couldn’t tell if that were a good thing or a bad thing. But then the ride started and every thought except “HOLY SHIT!” was driven from his mind.  
When they stumbled off the ride a while later, they all had to lean against something solid to keep their heads from spinning. Stan, Red, and Butters had to rush over to the nearest garbage can to throw up.  
“Ok, let’s do something more low key now,” Stan mumbled when he shuffled back over to his friends. The others could only mutter their agreement.  
“It’s a good thing we haven’t eaten yet,” Cartman muttered, leaning on a post.  
“Someone else suggest something before Kyle and Cartman kill us with their ideas,” Kenny gasped. Both of his friends glared at him but didn’t respond.  
Stan watched out of the corner of his eye which direction Wendy and her friends headed off to. Then he turned to look for a ride in the opposite direction and spotted something nice and slow immediately.  
“CABLE CARS!” he shouted, just as Kenny opened his mouth to suggest something. “Let’s go!” Then he quickly took off in the direction of the lift, leaving his friends to stare in shock and quickly follow after him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yup. Can’t really think of any other way to end this chapter, so there you go. The Carnival is going to be three chapters long, including this one, so we still have two more chapters of this. And it’s all going to be delightfully awkward.  
> I really only have a couple of ride scenes planned out though, so if you have any suggestions, feel free to leave a comment in a review or pm and I’ll make sure to credit you if I use it. Until next time! Love!


	17. I have no idea what's going on anymore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m hungry. Also, I’m getting super annoyed with the new episodes with going back and forth constantly about whether or not Cartman and Heidi are in a relationship. I’m really kind of sick of it at this point. Also, since I like to try and make my fan fictions as close to canon as possible, it’s making it really hard for my sequel to this story…  
> Anyways, we’re going to awkwardly ride some more rides today! That will be fun! I think! And some other stuff is also going to be revealed! Yay!
> 
> “This is who we are. I don’t think we’ll ever change!”

There was a surprisingly long line when they got to the cable cars, but it was moving really fast since it didn’t stop. The only people who got in line after them was Craig and his gang, which was fortunate, because once the four friends got to the front, they all stood there awkwardly, not really comfortable with discussing who was going to sit with who. The cable cars were big enough for three people to fit, but that didn’t help matters. The employees manning the ride were a couple more of the “just happy to be there” types, so they just stood there patiently while the four of them continued to stand there awkwardly.  
Obviously three of them couldn’t take one car, because that would be leaving one of them out, and there was no way in hell Kyle and Stan were going to share a car that was fifty feet in the air that was easy to shove someone out of. And Cartman secretly wanted to share a car with Kyle, but there was no way he would ever admit that out loud. None of them really wanted to share a car with Stan either, because-  
“Oh, for crying out loud!” Clyde suddenly shouted, losing his patience and startling everyone, including his own friends. He angrily grabbed Cartman and Stan’s arms and shoved them in front of the oncoming cable car, then shoved Kenny and Kyle in front of the next one, before finally grabbing Token’s arm and dragged him over to the next one to finally get on, leaving everyone bewildered as to what had just happened.  
Kenny and Kyle sat in silence for a moment as Kenny pulled random things out of his pockets and dropped them onto the heads of people below them (including something that he thought was an olive, but it flew away the moment he let go of it). As he stared in confusion after it, Kyle let out a long sigh.  
“How the hell are we going to fix this mess, Kenny?” he wondered. Kenny blinked and turned to look at him, thinking it over for a moment.  
“I have no idea, dude,” he sighed. “That bitch is somehow one step ahead of us no matter what! I mean, I know we call her a witch, but seems like she’s actually a witch sometimes.”  
“It would explain why Stan is so ready to agree with her all the time,” Kyle muttered bitterly under his breath. “It doesn’t help that everyone has been acting so strange lately.”  
“Everyone?” Kenny repeated.  
“Tweek is two cars behind us, actually riding the cable cars,” Kyle pointed out to him. “Tell me that’s not strange.”  
Kenny, trying carefully not to swing the cable car with his movement, turned to stare past Clyde and Token. Sure enough, Tweek was sitting with Craig, clinging to his very bored looking boyfriend, with a face that screamed that he instantly regretted getting on this ride.  
“To be fair, he doesn’t look all that happy to be on this ride,” Kenny said, turning around again. Kyle sighed in response.  
“And Cartman’s definitely acted the strangest,” he continued. “You know he hasn’t done one evil thing to me in, like, three weeks?” Kenny blinked at him and was glad that his hood hid the fact that he was biting his lip. “And don’t you try to tell me that you haven’t noticed,” Kyle added when Kenny started to speak again. “You know I’ve even tried to get him angry at me and he hasn’t done a single thing about it?”  
“Really?” Kenny asked, taken off guard. “You want him to be angry at you?”  
“I don’t know,” he sighed. “It’s better than what he’s doing now. It’s really starting to freak me out. And I really think he doesn’t know that I noticed how weird he’s been, but I have. And I have enough to worry about as it is.”  
He covered his face with his hands as he let out a groan. Kenny pressed against his side comfortingly, not really sure what else to say. Should he tell him what he read when he snuck into Dr. Pidd’s office? Somehow, he really didn’t think that would make him feel any better. And if Cartman ever found out… Kenny shuddered just thinking about it.  
“Maybe Dr. Pidd is brainwashing everyone,” Kenny said instead. Kyle looked up at him.  
“What does that replacement therapist have to do with anything?” he wondered.  
“I mean, everyone except the two of us have been to see her, and we already know what kind of advice she gives,” Kenny pointed out. “And let’s face it, dude. She’s really creepy.”  
“Yeah, I guess that’s true,” Kyle muttered.  
They didn’t get to say anything more as their car came back into the lift and they were forced to disembark. Stan and Cartman stood near the exit waiting for them, both still looking a bit awkward standing next to each other. Apparently, while Kyle and Kenny had an entire conversation while on the ride, their two friends had just sat in silence the entire time, not making a single sound to each other.  
“So, what do you guys want to do next?” Kenny asked when he and Kyle approached them.  
“I’m hungry,” Cartman announced.  
“You’re always hungry,” Kyle pointed out, rolling his eyes. “And that didn’t answer his question.” Cartman blinked at him for a moment before continuing as if he hadn’t been interrupted.  
“There were a couple of food stands that looked really good, and I think I saw a Dip N Dots too,” he said excitedly, turning to the others.  
“Fine, we’ll go eat,” Stan sighed. “But only because it’s lunch time and I’m hungry too.”  
“Well, I get to pick what we’re doing next,” Kenny said as they headed off.  
The food stands were filled with mostly disgruntled employees, but the food itself smelled amazing and artery clogging. They all ordered something from different stands (except for Cartman, who ordered something from every stand) and then they went over to one of the nearby picnic tables.  
They ate quietly and were about half way finished before trouble finally caught up with them. And by trouble, I mean Angela finally caught up to them.  
“Hey Stan!” she greeted, coming over and sitting down next to him. “I’ve been looking all over for you! Where have you been? Why are you over here?”  
Stan gulped while Kyle drew away from her with a hiss. “Um, I just wanted to hang out with Kenny and Cartman today,” he told her, not looking the others in the eye. “Because, you know, they’re still my friends.”  
“Well, why didn’t you say so?” Angela replied as Kyle narrowed his eyes at him. “Being a loving and supportive girlfriend, I don’t mind if you want to hang out with your friends once in a while without me. But, will you at least go on one ride with me later?”  
“Sure,” Stan said nervously, finding her wording to be quite strange and a bit worrying. She leaned forward and kissed him deeply before walking off. For some reason, he wasn’t even sort of prepared for the look that Kyle was giving him when he turned back around. Mostly because it wasn’t a look of rage or anger that he was expecting to receive, but instead there was a look of pain in his eyes. He blinked in surprise, but Kyle had already turned to stare at something else, no longer touching his food.  
When they finally finished a few minutes later, Kenny dragged them to a nearby pirate ship ride that swung back and forth like a pendulum, which they went on three or four times in a row trying to find the perfect place to sit on the ship to get the most out of it. Afterwards, they made their way towards the middle of the park, looking for something else to ride.  
Kyle was just about to suggest that they try one of the carnival games when Craig’s little sister, Tricia walked past them, cheerfully dragging a kicking and screaming Ike by his ankles towards the Tunnel of Love.  
“Oh, hey Ike,” Kyle calmly greeted his brother as he was dragged past them.  
“HELP MEEEEEEE!” Ike cried out desperately, clawing at the ground. Kyle didn’t even sort of move.  
“Ok, bye Ike,” he called after him before turning to his friends. He was about to make a comment about how he was glad that none of them had to go on the Tunnel of Love, when suddenly Angela walked past them and grabbed Stan by the arm and started dragging him in the same direction.  
“Come on, Stan!” she said happily. “Let’s go on the Tunnel of Love! It will be so romantic!” She completely ignored Stan’s protests that he would rather do anything else than go on that ride. His friends stared after them in amazement.  
“Boy, I am so glad none of us are dating anyone,” Kenny said, turning to the other two. “Otherwise we…”  
He was cut off when Wendy suddenly walked past them and grabbed Kyle by the collar of his coat, cutting off his breathing, and also dragged him backwards towards the Tunnel of Love, with no explanation of why she was doing so whatsoever and only leaving Kenny and Cartman to stare after them in astonishment. Cartman blinked then glanced at Kenny in surprise. Kenny blinked back at him before smiling suggestively. Cartman frowned at him.  
“I don’t think so, Kenny,” he growled at him before walking off to go order more food.  
Kyle tried to dig his heels into the ground while also asking Wendy where she was taking him, but that was kind of hard to do when he couldn’t breathe. Eventually she decided to have mercy on him and switched her death grip to his arm, but she didn’t even sort of slow down, despite his efforts.  
“Oh God, Wendy,” Kyle gasped. “Please don’t tell me you’re actually dragging me onto the Tunnel of Love with you!”  
“Ok, I won’t tell you that,” Wendy replied nonchalantly. Kyle let out a groan in response and tried to pull his arm free, but her grip on him was too tight and she was too determined to follow Stan and Angela.  
The couple were already in line by the time Wendy and Kyle caught up to them. Token and Nichole were standing in line in front of them, with Nichole muttering about how this ride looked stupid and boring while Token basically ignored her, and Clyde was also standing there with some girl none of them recognized, looking totally freaked out.  
“Hey Clyde!” Wendy greeted as they walked up and Kyle immediately attempted to chew his own arm off. “Who’s your new lady friend?” Clyde looked at the girl, then back at Wendy.  
“I have no idea,” he said in a voice that totally screamed “Help me!” Then, as the girl standing next to him happily looped an arm around him and pulled him closer to her body, they all heard snickering and Clyde turned to glare at Craig, who was standing a few feet away, out of the line, holding Tweek’s hand and laughing at his best friend. “Oh, fuck off, Craig!” he snarled at him.  
Stan didn’t say anything, but his nervousness over Angela’s sudden romantic wants was gone the moment he saw Wendy and Kyle walk up to them, and he couldn’t help but narrow his eyes at his former best friend. He was so wrapped up in glaring at Kyle, who was still desperately trying to free himself of Wendy’s iron clad grip, that he didn’t notice that Clyde was rolling his eyes and sighing behind him. He for some reason really didn’t like the pleasant, totally ignoring him and Angela, smile Wendy had on her face.  
It made Stan start to wonder. Did Kyle’s promise that he would never date his best friend’s ex-girlfriend disintegrate if he and Kyle were no longer friends? Did those sorts of rules still apply, especially if he was dating someone else now? And more importantly, why did he still care if Wendy still liked him or not? Why couldn’t his life be simpler than this?  
He was cut out of his thoughts when he suddenly realized that he and Angela were somehow near the front of the line. The only ones in front of them were Clyde and the creepy mystery girl who had dragged him onto the ride in the first place. She still had an arm around him and was still smiling and ignoring his vain attempts to get away. She dragged him into one of the boats with ease before climbing in herself.  
“Someone help me!” Clyde cried out desperately, turning to his waiting friends.  
“Don’t get any hickies, Clyde!” Craig called out to him, still laughing. Clyde glared at him as the boat moved away.  
“Fuck you, Craig!” he called to his friend.  
“Looks like we’re next, love,” Angela said flirtatiously to Stan, kissing him on the mouth.  
Stan was about to reply, but there was a sharp cry behind him, making him turn around. Wendy was still standing there, smiling, but she was stiff as a board and her smile had dropped slightly. Her grip on Kyle’s arm had tightened so much so that he had slowly crumbled to the ground in pain.  
Stan stared at them in confusion and opened his mouth to ask a question, but the next boat had arrived and Angela quickly pulled him forward and onto the boat. It wasn’t until they were out of sight before Wendy relaxed her grip enough so that Kyle could stand. He was panting slightly as he stood and glared at her, but before he could tell her never to do that again, another boat arrived and she began pulling him towards it.  
“Come on, Kyle,” she said, determinedly cheerful. “It won’t be that bad!”  
“Fine,” Kyle growled. “But if you try to make out with me, I’m pushing you off the boat.” Wendy laughed and quickly kissed him on the cheek as they sat down. Then she finally let go of his arm and he immediately yanked it away and pulled up his sleeve. “I think you left an indentation in my arm,” he complained, looking down at it.  
“You’ll get over it,” Wendy said, still smiling at him.  
“Is there a reason why you decided to drag me of all people onto this ride with you?” Kyle asked, folding his arms. Wendy frowned.  
“What?” she replied. “Can’t two friends enjoy a nice relaxing totally not weird at all ride on the Tunnel of Love as just friends?”  
“No,” Kyle answered with a slight growl.  
“Well, too bad, that’s what we’re doing,” Wendy giggled. Kyle rolled his eyes and cast an incredibly bored eye out at the cheesy decorations that surrounded them.  
Unfortunately, there was really loud, cheesy, romantic music playing above them. Fortunately, it was loud enough to drown out everything the stupid cupid robots were saying. It was clear that all of the animatronics were not singing along with the music, and their mouths were moving, but it was impossible to hear. There were a bunch of “couples” dancing on the either side of the ride, with cupid angels that had smiles eerily similar to that of Dr. Pidd’s creepy smile.  
There was probably a plot going on with the robots, because they kept seeing the same “characters” over and over in different positions with different expressions, but again, it was impossible to tell over the music.  
“Wow,” Kyle said sarcastically after what seemed like forever. “I’ve never been so excited about not knowing what the heck is going on in my entire life.”  
“Did anyone know that the music was louder than the dialogue?” Wendy questioned. “Or were they thinking that the story was so stupid they had to find some way to drown it out?”  
“I’m seriously thinking about just jumping out of this boat right now and drowning myself,” Kyle sighed, trying to look at anything except the stupid decorations.  
“How long is this stupid ride anyways?” Wendy complained. Kyle glanced at her.  
“You can’t complain,” he pointed out. “You’re the one who wanted to go on this stupid ride.” Wendy gave him a charming smile and shrugged innocently.  
“I thought it would be funny,” she claimed. Then she put her hands on her hips, puffing out her chest proudly. “And I was totally right.” Kyle simply scoffed in reply.  
Outside of the ride, Kenny, Cartman, Craig and Tweek sat on a bench near the exit, waiting for their friends to come out. Kenny kicked his feet while Craig checked his watch. Tweek was casting paranoid glances all over the place and twitching like mad.  
“How long is that ride?” Cartman growled eventually. “It feels like they’ve been in there forever!”  
Kenny opened his mouth to reply, but he was interrupted when Craig suddenly burst out laughing. The three of them jumped in surprise at the sudden outburst, and noticed him pointing towards the exit of the ride. Then they spotted Clyde getting off. He looked absolutely horrified and his face was covered with kiss marks, with his hair messier than usual. The girl who had forced him on the ride with her gave him a wink and a seductive smile as she walked off. Clyde immediately spotted Craig laughing and angrily stormed over to them.  
“It’s not funny, Craig,” he growled at him.  
“It’s hilarious!” Craig said between laughs.  
“It’s pretty funny,” Kenny agreed.  
“WHO WAS THAT!?!” Clyde burst out, trying to rub the kiss marks off his face. Craig was laughing so hard at his friend at this point that he fell off the bench in a fit of laughter as Tweek stared down at him in horror.  
“Wow, that is the most emotion I have ever seen Craig give in my entire life,” Cartman pointed out calmly, looking down at him. Clyde didn’t reply, but he continued to stare daggers at his best friend.  
It took another couple of minutes for Craig to finally stop laughing hard enough to actually speak and sit up again, and Clyde continued to glare at him the entire time.  
“It wasn’t that funny,” Clyde snarled as Craig used him to pull himself up.  
“You think that, but the cramp in my side I got from laughing too hard doesn’t lie,” Craig pointed out, completely calm again.  
“I didn’t know Craig could laugh,” Kenny muttered, mostly to himself.  
Tweek opened his mouth to add his own commentary, but at that moment, Stan and Angela exited the ride and slowly made their way over to them.  
“That was so romantic,” Angela was gushing. “That story that they decided to create in there, I think I was about to cry!”  
“What story?” Clyde asked, whipping around to glare at them. “I couldn’t hear a single thing over the music they were blaring in my ears. They could have had those stupid robots say anything and nobody would be able to tell the difference.”  
“Shows what you know,” Angela scoffed, tossing her hair before turning to Stan. “Anyways, I’ll let you go back with your friends now. See you later, sweetie!”  
“Bye,” Stan replied, smiling at her. She gave him a long, deep kiss before turning and skipping off. Stan smiled after her, and turned just in time to see Kenny, Cartman, Clyde, Craig AND Tweek all roll their eyes at him. Immediately, his smile dropped into an angry frown.  
“What?” Stan growled at them. Tweek eyed something behind him and he turned around and almost had a heart attack when he saw Kyle and Wendy standing right there, both of them glaring at him. And for some reason, he immediately felt guilty about the whole thing.  
“I’ll see you guys later,” Wendy said shortly before Stan could say anything. She gave Kyle a quick, friendly hug that Stan’s brain immediately misinterpreted into looking a lot more romantic than it actually was. “Thanks for putting up with that, Kyle.”  
“Just don’t do it again,” Kyle ordered, his face softening a bit. Wendy smiled and let go of him before taking her own leave as well. Kyle turned towards Stan and rolled his eyes when he saw him frowning at him. “Don’t give me that look,” he growled. “I didn’t ask to be dragged onto that stupid ride.”  
“Can we go do something else now?” Clyde asked Craig before Stan could speak. Craig, who was sitting next to Tweek now and looking extremely comfortable on that bench, let out a long sigh.  
“I guess,” he said after a moment.  
“Where did Token go?” Clyde wondered as his two friends stood up and Kyle went over to take their seat.  
“Oh, I don’t know,” Craig said nonchalantly. “I think he went off to suck face with his girlfriend or something like that.”  
“We’re probably not going to see him again,” Tweek murmured as the three of them walked away. Stan stared after them for a moment before turning back to his friends.  
“It’s about time you guys got out of that ride,” Kenny decided to pipe in. “So, how bad was it?”  
“Really, really bad,” Stan confessed. “Clyde couldn’t hear the dialogue? I couldn’t even hear what Angela was saying and she was sitting next to me.”  
“What was seen in there can never be unseen,” Kyle muttered vaguely.  
“That bad, huh?” Cartman said with a note of sympathy in his voice.  
“Ok, before we do anything else, I must go pee,” Kenny announced, standing up. Cartman rolled his eyes at him.  
“And why couldn’t have gone while we were just sitting here waiting for them?” he asked him with a hint of annoyance. Kenny blinked at him.  
“I didn’t have to go then,” he answered.  
“I’ll go with you,” Stan told him as he started walking away. “I want to get a drink before we do anything else.” Then the two of them left, leaving Kyle and Cartman to sit there in awkward silence.  
Cartman felt his heart begin to speed up, and for a moment he hoped that Kyle couldn’t hear how loud it was beating. He tried to look nonchalant, he had been alone with Kyle plenty of times now, but he couldn’t stop a bead of sweat from dripping down his face. Thankfully, Kyle wasn’t looking at him and was just staring at the nearby carousel, which only had children from the second grade and younger riding it (and Butters, who looked the most excited out of all of them).  
With a sigh, Cartman decided to take a chance in asking Kyle if he wanted to go on something else while they waited. But he hadn’t even opened his mouth to ask when Ike suddenly ran up to them.  
“Kyle, will you go on the haunted house ride with me?” Ike asked his older brother. “It’s not that I’m scared, I think it’s more fun to go with someone.”  
“Why can’t you ask one of your friends to go with you?” Kyle asked, still keeping his eyes on the carousel. “Or Tricia?”  
“Because my friends are all scared, and Tricia scares me,” Ike replied, unaware of Cartman narrowing his eyes at him. “And besides, dad said you’d go with me.”  
“No, he didn’t,” Kyle growled, looking down at him. “I can clearly see him even from here, and he’s still asleep at that picnic table.”  
“Please?” Ike whined, letting the word draw out while giving him the biggest puppy dog eyes. Kyle rolled his eyes in response.  
“You’re not going to like it,” he pointed out. “That ride is way too scary for you.”  
“No, it’s not!” his brother responded, folding his arms. Kyle let out a frustrated sigh.  
“Fine!” he said eventually. “I’ll go with you! But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” As Ike gave an excited “Yay,” he slowly stood and turned to Cartman. “Tell the others where I’ve gone, ok?” Cartman tried to suppress a sigh.  
“Ok,” he replied. Then he watched as the two of them walked off, and he cursed silently under his breath. “Damn it, Ike,” he snarled. “I really fucking hate you right now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I think this chapter has gone on long enough. I did the Tunnel of Love thing where everyone on it was forced onto it by someone because I thought it would be funny. I have no idea who the girl who dragged Clyde onto it was, but she may or may not return in a future chapter. I just thought it would be hilarious if he was forced to go on with someone he had never met before.  
> Anyways, let me know what you think in a comment. And remember to call your mother. Love!


	18. When Life Gives You Lemons, tell it to Fuck off

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, in this chapter, Cartman is going to try a lot harder to get Kyle alone to tell him how he feels about him. Will he succeed? Well, why don’t you just read the chapter and find out, you lazy bums? Love you!
> 
> “They say just grow up, but they don’t know us!”

Kenny and Stan were quite confused when they returned to find Kyle gone and Cartman sitting on the bench alone, angrily folding his arms. For some reason, he sounded very annoyed when he told them that Ike had dragged his brother off to a haunted house ride. There were actually two haunted houses in the park, one was a walk-through house while the other was a ride. Thankfully, the author told them which one Ike and Kyle had gone to because she forgot to clarify in the last chapter, so they made their way over to the walk-through haunted house.  
Kyle and Ike came out about five minutes later, with an absolutely terrified Ike clinging in fear to his very annoyed brother’s face.  
“I told you it would be too much for you,” Kyle growled as he walked over to his friends.  
“I d-d-don’t know what you are t-t-talking about,” Ike argued, still clinging to him in fear. “I j-just thought the v-v-view was b-better from up here!”  
“Did you think you’d have a better view if you screamed in my ear the entire time too?” Kyle asked sarcastically, trying to pry his brother off of his face. Ike continued tried to fight being yanked away from him, but they could hear him mutter under his breath “Shut up!”  
Ike had no idea why Cartman had a smug look on his face when Kyle finally managed to pry him off of him, but he decided to ignore it and get him back at a later time.  
“So, how was the ride?” Kenny asked with a grin. Kyle glared at him.  
“Fuck off, Kenny,” he snapped at him.  
“So, which ride should we do next?” Stan asked as Ike let out a scream and dashed off, being quickly pursued by Tricia.  
“Tilt-a-Whirl!” Cartman declared excitedly before anyone could suggest anything else. They took off down the path, and were glad to see that there was barely a line and this time there was no one on the ride to have awkward encounters with.  
The boys split up when they were let onto the ride, trying to find the perfect combination that would allow them all to spin the most. Cartman tried not to look shocked or panicked when he saw Kyle make his way over to him.  
“Hey, can I sit with you?” he asked him. Cartman forced himself to remain calm. It wasn’t working very well.  
“Why?” he managed to ask without sounding terrified.  
“Because I think with your fat ass, we could easily get the maximum amount of spins out of this ride,” Kyle pointed out calmly. “Or break down entirely. Either way, I’m sure it will be hilarious.” Cartman’s expression remained unchanged.  
“Sure, have a seat,” he replied after a moment. Kyle tried not to let out a hiss of frustration as he sat down next to him. He glared out at the space in front of him, completely unaware of Cartman staring nervously at him.  
Cartman opened his mouth to say something, but at that moment Butters came up to them with an annoyingly loud greeting.  
“Heya, fellas!” he greeted happily. “Is it all right if I sit with you guys? I always think the Tilt-a-Whirl is way more fun with more people on it. Plus, this ride makes me nervous if I go on it alone.”  
“Sure, go ahead,” Kyle replied nonchalantly before Cartman could tell him to fuck off. Butters smiled.  
“Thanks!” he said before stepping over and shoving himself in between Cartman and Kyle. Cartman glared at him in complete and utter rage as Butters sat there and kicked his feet happily. He had half a mind to rant to Butters exactly what he thought of him, but the employee came by at that moment to make sure they were in properly before going back to the control panel and cheerily starting the ride.  
Almost immediately, the three of them were thrown sideways as the ride started spinning them around at ridiculous speeds. Butters and Kyle were nearly crushed as Cartman was pressed against them, and Butters let out a scream of fear, not echoed by the others. Thankfully, the screaming stopped half way through as Butters started to turn green and covered his mouth with his hand. Three minutes later when the ride stopped, he quickly rushed off the ride in his hurry to get to the nearest trash can.  
“Wimp,” Cartman said, watching him go.  
“I know, right?” Kyle agreed as they stood up. “It wasn’t that fast.”  
Kenny and Stan both looked kind of dizzy, despite the fact that they didn’t spin nearly as fast or as much as their friends did. Cartman gave them both an evil grin.  
“Do you guys want to do that one again?” he asked casually.  
“No!” Stan and Kenny both snapped at him.  
“Wimps,” Kyle muttered.  
“I think we’re due for a slower ride now,” Kenny pointed out before Stan could hurl an insult back at him. “Can we do something that won’t make me puke my brains out?”  
“What about the train?” Stan suggested after a moment of thought. “It’s nice and slow. And it goes through the entire park.”  
“Yeah!” Kenny agreed. “And I can get more steps for my Pokémon Go app.”  
“You’re still playing that?” Cartman wondered. “I thought Pokémon Go stopped being relevant months ago.” Kenny glared at him.  
“It will never stop being relevant,” he declared before leading the way towards the train station.   
“Cheater,” Stan muttered under his breath. Kyle let out a sigh.  
“Fine,” he said. “But after the train, we’re going on that one next.” His friends’ eyes widened with terror as they looked over to where he was pointing. A huge, looming, tower that was as high as the largest roller coaster towered over them. It was one of those rides that took the people all the way to the top, let them sit there for an eternity, and drop them at high speeds. It was the stuff of nightmares.  
“If we don’t go on the train, do we still have to do that one?” Kenny asked after a moment of just staring in wide eyed horror.  
“Yes,” Kyle declared. “Stop being a wimp.”  
They couldn’t decide if they were surprised or not when they saw Craig, Clyde, Tweek, Token and Nichole already waiting at the train station. Stan muttered something about Craig and his gang secretly following them as they made their way over to them. The train wasn’t in from the previous ride yet, and when they sat down, they were quickly joined by Wendy, Red, and Bebe. Stan let out a groan and tried not to be seen by them.  
“Oh, hey Benedict Arnold,” Bebe greeted, looking over and immediately spotting Stan. “Still looking for more people to stab in the back?”  
“Bebe, put a sock in it,” Wendy sighed, rolling her eyes while Stan glared at her friend. Bebe frowned at her, but didn’t reply as she tossed her hair.  
Thankfully, they were saved momentarily from further awkwardness by the arrival of the train. The previous passengers quickly disembarked as the group was let on. Craig and Tweek went over and sat in the middle of the train. As soon as they sat down, however, Craig immediately and promptly fell asleep. Clyde went over and squeezed himself in between Tweek and the sleeping Craig, while Nichole and Token quickly took to the back of the train.  
Wendy and her friends sat in the front of the train, while the four boys just spread themselves out along the train. Stan tried to sit close to the front, but not too close in case the girls thought he was trying to ease drop, while his friends sat closer to Tweek, Craig and Clyde. Before the train took off, they were joined by Timmy, who rolled his wheelchair over to the special handicapped space right behind Stan. Then the train finally took off.  
Immediately, whatever Wendy was saying to Bebe and Red was drowned out by Timmy shouting right behind Stan. He flinched and tried to lean closer to them, but it was really no use. He continued to hate himself for be so caught up in what his ex-girlfriend was potentially saying about him all the time when he had another girlfriend to worry about, but he couldn’t help it.  
“You couldn’t have picked a more boring ride, Kenny,” Cartman was growling to his friend. “This train is the slowest ass thing I’ve ever been on.”  
“Well excuse me for not wanting to go on all of the extreme rides all the time,” Kenny snapped at him, rolling his eyes.  
“We’re going to be here forever,” Cartman grumbled.  
“Come on, this ride isn’t that bad,” Tweek said, turning around to look at him. “It’s nice and relaxing and there’s absolutely nothing terrifying on it.”  
“Hey, look!” Clyde pointed out excitedly. “We’re gonna go through a tunnel!”  
“A WHAT!?!” Tweek screamed, turning around in terror and throwing his arms around Clyde’s neck. Clyde made a strange noise as Tweek immediately started unintentionally strangling him as they were all thrown into pitch darkness for a few long moments. When the train emerged from the other side of the tunnel, Tweek was shivering uncontrollably, and Clyde was trying to free himself from his grip. Cartman was laughing at them, and Craig continued to remain fast asleep.  
“Thank God that’s over,” Tweek sighed, slowly relaxing his grip on Clyde. “Who knows what could have been on the other side of that thing.”  
“Oh hey,” Kyle pointed out calmly, sitting forward to squeeze in between Kenny and Cartman. “Here comes another one.” Immediately, before Clyde could even catch his breath, Tweek’s arms were around his neck again, squeezing the life out of him and he began to regret sitting next to the twitchy blonde. Tweek didn’t relax again until they were pulling back into the train station and he was assured that there were no more tunnels.  
“Can we ride that one again?” Kenny asked as the four of them regrouped and watched Clyde angrily try to poke Craig awake. “I really don’t want to go on that tower drop ride.”  
“I don’t know what you’re so afraid of,” Kyle replied, rolling his eyes. “It’s just like a roller coaster, only it consists of the first hill. It just picks you up and drops you, it’s not so bad.”  
“Picks you up and drops you?” Craig repeated, suddenly waking up and startling all of them. “Hell yeah! That sounds awesome!” He quickly grabbed Tweek and Clyde’s arms. “Come on, let’s also go on that one!”  
Clyde and Tweek glanced at each other in absolute fear as Craig dragged them towards the end of the train where Token and Nichole were waiting. Kyle led his friends after them, ignoring the whining that was coming from them.  
“Come on, Token,” Craig said as he approached his other friend. “We’re going on that tower ride next.” Token blinked at him in surprise, opened his mouth to tell Craig that he would drag him onto that ride when he was good and dead, but was immediately interrupted by a squeal of delight from Nichole.  
“Tower Drop?” she said excitedly. “Fuck yeah! Come on, Token!”  
“Why is it always the quiet ones who are the most terrifyingly extreme?” Kenny muttered under his breath as they made their way over to the dreaded ride.  
Not even an order from God would have gotten Tweek to go on this ride, and thankfully Craig’s eyes softened as he told his boyfriend that he didn’t have to go on it if he didn’t want to. Tweek gave him a grateful hug before rushing over to sit and curl up on a bench that was fifty feet away. Token watched him go before turning to Craig.  
“How about I go sit with him and make sure no one talks to him or anything,” he said nervously. “You know, make sure he doesn’t wander off or be taken by strangers or something. I know how over protective you can be about it.” Craig glared at him.  
“I am not over protective!” he growled at him. “And if I come back and find one hair misplaced on his precious little head, I will strangle you with my own bare hands!”  
Token rolled his eyes but didn’t reply as he went over to sit down next to Tweek. Cartman watched them go before turning to his own friends.  
“How come they get to puss out of this ride and we don’t?” he complained.  
“Because,” Kyle replied simply. “Now let’s go.”  
Stan, Kenny, Cartman and Clyde all nervously picked their seats with growing dread, Craig and Kyle got situated with a great amount of disinterest, and Nichole looked like her entire life had been leading up to that very moment. The disgruntled employee strapped them all in before going over and starting the ride.  
“Wow!” Nichole said excitedly to Stan, who was sitting next to her. “I can’t believe how high this tower goes! I mean, I think it goes even higher than the roller coasters, and they go pretty high!” Stan’s eyes widened with fear as they went ever higher. “Hey look!” Nichole suddenly said when they were finally at the top. “I think I can see my parents from here! They look like tiny little ants!”  
And, as she was about to attempt to call out to her parents who would have had obviously not heard her, the catch holding them was released, and they all plummeted towards the ground. All of them, except Kyle (who was laughing), Nichole (who was letting out a yell of primal joy), and Craig (who just looked as nonchalant as ever), screamed and cried all the way to the ground, screamed and cried when it suddenly bounced back up, and screamed and cried as they were dropped again.  
Token and Tweek, in the meantime, had been staring up at them as the ride slowly raised off the ground and into the sky. Token watched his girlfriend in fear as he could make out the fact that she was babbling excitedly.  
“Oh my God, she’s gonna die up there,” he muttered, mostly to himself before turning to Tweek. “Well, Tweek, I hope you liked having a boyfriend, because it looks like they’re goners.” Tweek didn’t reply, but merely stared at him in confused fear.  
Obviously, they didn’t die, but Token almost did when they dropped and Tweek threw his arms around him in terror. Two minutes later, their friends were let off the ride, and Kyle and Craig were snickering at Clyde who was muttering about having to go to the bathroom to “dry himself.” Craig immediately went over and sat down next to Tweek and wrapped his arms around him, trying to tell him and Token what they had missed out on.  
“I need to go throw up,” Stan muttered, quickly dashing after Clyde towards the bathrooms.  
“And I need to go look into the mirror and cry,” Kenny said calmly, slowly following them.  
“Come on,” Craig managed to gasp to Token (which was very hard to do, since Tweek had also thrown his arms around him and was practically crushing him). “Let’s go find a more relaxing ride for Tweek.”  
“Shouldn’t we wait for Clyde to get back?” Token asked, standing up.  
“No,” Craig answered simply. He slowly started to drag Tweek away as Token followed close behind him.  
Cartman stared after them for a moment, then turned to watch as Kyle went over to sit at the nearby bench to wait for their friends. He took a gulp of breath before going over and sitting down next to him. They sat in silence for a moment before Cartman let out a sigh.  
“So…” he started to say, but he found himself being interrupted once again by Ike running up to them.  
“Kyle, go on the other haunted house ride with me!” he begged, not even bothering to greet his older brother this time. Kyle rolled his eyes in annoyance as Cartman glared daggers at the tiny child.  
“No, Ike,” he replied. “You couldn’t handle the first one, what makes you think that you would do better with the second haunted house?” Ike blinked at him for a moment.  
“You don’t have to walk through this one,” he said at last.  
“Why do you want to go on these things so badly?” Kyle asked him.  
“Pleeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaase?” Ike whined. Kyle let out a long sigh of frustration.  
“Fine!” he said. “But this is the last time!” Ike let out a cheer and grabbed his brother’s hand, starting to pull him away. Kyle turned back to Cartman as he was dragged away. “Tell the others where we’ve gone,” he requested with a note of defeat in his voice.  
“Yeah, yeah,” Cartman grumbled. He glared after them and waited until they were out of earshot before hissing, “You’re on my shit list, Ike!”  
When Stan and Kenny returned to a fuming Cartman, they made their way over to the other haunted house (which was called the “Whacky Shack of Horrors”). Kyle and Ike were already emerging with Ike looking even more terrified than before, still screaming as he clung to his very bored and annoyed older brother.  
“Yeah, I don’t think either of us are going to be able to sleep tonight,” Kyle growled as he tried to pull Ike off of him.  
“Those eyes!” Ike whined. “They were all staring! Never sleep again!”  
“I warned you,” Kyle pointed out. “Will you let go of me, now?”  
“No!” his brother declared.  
His friends tried not to snicker as Kyle struggled to pull Ike off of him, and it wasn’t until a good five minutes later before Ike finally calmed down enough to release him.  
“I think your entire family is just a glutton for self-punishment,” Kenny noted with a hint of humor to his voice. Kyle glared at him, holding his tiny brother at arm’s length.  
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he growled at him. He set Ike back on the ground and told him to go find his friends before turning back to his friends. “I am so glad there are only two of those,” he muttered.  
“You guys want to go on the Iron Giant now?” Cartman asked suddenly, an evil grin spreading over his face. Stan and Kenny stared at him for a moment.  
“Cartman, we just got back from puking our brains out,” Kenny pointed out. Cartman continued to grin evilly at him.  
“So?” he replied. Kenny’s only response was to glare at him.  
“Why don’t we just compromise and do a ride that’s fast, but not extreme?” Stan suggested. Kenny and Cartman both agreed, while Kyle muttered something angrily under his breath that Stan knew was directed at him, but he couldn’t make it out.  
They went to the bumper cars where they watch Craig struggle to drag Tweek on with him, where they were sure the only reason why Tweek didn’t try to escape when they sat down was because Craig had his arms around him. Then they watched as Craig, Clyde and Token only tried to bump into each other the entire ride, while other people tried and failed to crash into Butters, who was just happily doing laps in his own car.  
They decided to go on some of their more favorite rides again, and as they went up and down the boulevard, they noticed Nichole winning every single carnival game without even sort of breaking a sweat and forcing Token to hold all of the prizes she won. They had to go on quite a few more rides before Stan and Kenny agreed to go on the Iron Giant.   
The roller coaster was so huge, they could have sworn that the first hill was above the clouds. They watched as one train free fell off the first hill and land like a nuclear bomb. Kenny was only eighty percent certain that no one died when that happened.  
“Now that’s a roller coaster,” Cartman said happily, nudging Kenny in the arm.  
“Can I just sit this one out?” Kenny asked nervously, looking up at the monstrosity.  
“No,” all three of his friends replied at once.  
They dragged a kicking and screaming Kenny onto the roller coaster, then dragged him kicking and screaming onto the same coaster again when they decided they wanted to go on it again. By the time they got off the ride for the fourth time, Stan and Kenny both had to go throw up again and the sun was starting to set.  
“Hey, we haven’t done the Ferris Wheel yet,” Cartman said quickly as they watched Stan and Kenny make for the bathroom. “You want to go on that one now?” Kyle gave him a confused look before replying.  
“Shouldn’t we wait for them to get back?” he asked him. Cartman tried to make his shrug seem nonchalant.  
“Eh, they can catch up when they’re done,” he replied, anxious to get away before someone else came along to drag one of them away. Kyle opened his mouth to reply, but Cartman was already grabbing his arm and dragging him towards the Ferris Wheel.  
Kyle only had just enough time to call to Kenny that they were going to the Ferris Wheel (apparently) and see Kenny raise a hand in response before he was yanked away. He turned back to look at Cartman, who was looking incredibly nervous for some reason.  
“Jeez, Cartman,” he commented. “I didn’t know you liked the Ferris Wheel that much.”  
“Yeah, well,” Cartman muttered.  
“Will you slow down?” Kyle requested, trying not to trip, as Cartman still had a firm grip on his arm. “It’s not like the ride is going anywhere.” Cartman let out a sigh and slowed his step, but only slightly.  
There were fewer people in the park now, as it was getting late and close to dinner time. The only people in front of them in the line were a teenage couple making out like crazy, Butters’ parents (who hadn’t fallen asleep at the picnic area with the rest), and Tweek and Craig. Despite the fact that there was just one kid on the Ferris Wheel at the moment, they still had to wait a while in the line because the possibly clinically insane happy worker insisted on letting the kid go around uninterrupted, despite the fact that that one kid was screaming in absolute horror at the slow-moving ride. By the time the poor kid was finally let off the ride, he didn’t even wait for the worker to open the door for him before jumping over the side and rushing off the platform, crying the entire time.  
“Ok, seriously?” Kyle and Cartman heard Craig mutter under his breath. “Who gets on a Ferris Wheel and then realizes they’re afraid of it?”  
The compartments were open air, round, and large enough to fit at least seven people. The Ferris Wheel itself was massive, and one could easily see the entire grounds and most of the town from the top. When the worker finally let them on, Kyle and Cartman quickly scrambled into one of the compartments that was far away from the still making out couple, while Craig and Tweek took the one next to them.  
Kyle sat down on the opposite side of Cartman, looking out the side and immediately looking bored despite the ride not even moving yet. Cartman felt himself begin to finally relax as the worker went over to check on them before slowly going over to the control panels.  
He immediately tensed back up, however, when they heard someone shouting “Wait for us!” and saw someone running up the ramp to reach the ride. He relaxed again when he saw that it was only Clyde and Token, though he did notice out of the corner of his eye that Craig got visibly upset and narrow his eyes at his two friends when they immediately went over to sit with him and Tweek, talking in obnoxiously loud voices.  
Snickering, Cartman turned back around and opened his mouth to say something to Kyle, but at that moment, he saw Stan and Kenny also rushing towards them, shouting at the worker to not start the ride yet. Unfortunately for Cartman, the worker was more than happy to wait for the two boys to catch up. He couldn’t help but glare daggers as Stan and Kenny happily climbed on and sat down with them.  
“Boy, that was a close one,” Kenny huffed, out of breath from running. “I was afraid we weren’t going to make it!”  
“Yeah, can you imagine what would have happened if we hadn’t been able to catch up?” Stan said rather happily for some reason. Both he and Kenny didn’t seem to notice the look Cartman was giving them as the ride gave a jolt and finally started moving. Kyle didn’t say anything, but continued to stare out at the view with a bored expression on his face.  
“Wow, look at that sunset!” Kenny whistled when they were near the top. “What an incredibly view!”  
“Yeah, it really puts you in a strange mood, doesn’t it?” Stan said dreamily, unaware of the hostility that Cartman was directing towards him. “I mean, it probably wouldn’t make it any less awkward if it was just the two of you though. You’d probably just be sitting here in silence the entire time, huh? It’s a good thing we managed to catch up before the ride took off.”  
Cartman didn’t say anything, but continued to narrow his eyes angrily at his friends, barely able to contain his rage. Stan, continuing to not actually notice him, let out a laugh.  
“I mean, can you imagine what sort of things someone could do when they’re alone with someone?” he asked. Kyle gave him an apathetic look. “You could get the urge to confess your deepest, darkest secret up here. I mean, when you’re alone with someone, you can just tell them anything right? And it’s always better on a Ferris Wheel for some reason.”  
“Yeah!” Kenny agreed, suddenly thinking of something. “You could say anything! Even something totally ridiculous like…”  
He didn’t get to finish his thought, however, because at that moment, Cartman’s rage boiled over and he angrily shoved Kenny over the edge of the ride. Kenny fell out screaming, there was a long pause, and then a loud thud. Stan looked over the edge in horror, while Kyle completely unfazed, leaning on one arm.  
“You know,” Kyle said with a sigh. “Kenny dies so many times in this show, why should this surprise me? You know what? It doesn’t.”  
Stan opened his mouth to reply, but there was a sudden small popping sound, and suddenly Kenny jumped cut back into the ride with them, startling his friends.  
“What the hell was that for?” Kenny growled at Cartman, turning to glare at him. Cartman kept his expression blank as he shrugged in response.  
“You deserved it,” he replied.  
“For what?” Kenny wondered, but Cartman refused to answer, and all conversation was immediately ended for the rest of the ride.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to add more, but this chapter is getting long enough as it is, and I thought that was a funny enough note to end it on. Yes, I know in the show they say that every time Kenny dies, he wakes up in his bed and everyone forgets he dies, but I just thought it would be funny if he just literally popped back in with them.  
> So, I’ll explain what they did for the rest of the day in the next chapter, and we’ll be getting ready for the dance and the climax, so look forward to that. Some stuff is going to be explained, things are going to happen, it will be great. Don’t forget to leave a review and remember, women who carry a little extra weight live longer than men who mention it.


	19. This was a Terrible Idea

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The semester is almost over, and then it will be the holidays, so hopefully I’ll be getting a little bit more done. I’ve actually only have one final this semester, and that’s on Wednesday. I’m hoping to also finish this story soon so I can have the sequel started before I go back for next semester.   
> Also, I just wanted to say thanks for all of the kind reviews that I’ve been receiving, especially on Archive of Our Own. You guys are awesome! Anyways, let’s get it started in here!
> 
> “We don’t give a fuck and we’re never gonna change!”

When the ride finally came to a stop and they were allowed off, the three boys noticed that both Cartman and Craig wore the same “Fuck you guys” look on their faces for some reason. No one wanted to talk as they made their way off the ramp, even though for some inexplicable reason, Clyde and Token hadn’t even sort of noticed that Craig was glaring at them.  
The four boys regrouped far from the Ferris Wheel (they all suspected that the making out couple that had been in front of them had sex the entire ride since the compartment the couple had been in had been swinging around wildly) and stood awkwardly for a moment, not quite sure what to do now.  
Thankfully, they were saved from having to awkwardly ask Cartman what the hell that had been about by the arrival of Stan’s dad, who had finally woken up.  
“Well, I think I’ve had about as much fun as I can take,” Randy said as he approached, yawning and stretching. “Ready to go, slugger?”  
Stan glared slightly at him, wanting to point out that he had just been asleep the entire time, but instead just mumbled a noncommittal reply instead.  
“You boys need a ride home at all?” Randy asked.  
“No thanks,” Kyle said quickly. “My dad’s still asleep over there, so I’ve got a ride home.”  
“So is my mom,” Kenny added.  
“My mom’s not here, but I don’t feel like leaving yet,” Cartman stated.  
Randy shrugged in response. “Suit yourself,” he replied. “Come on, Stan. Let’s go.”  
Stan sighed and mumbled a quick farewell to them before turning and following his dad out of the park. Kenny’s mom showed up two minutes later, looking like she had just gotten over a hangover (which she probably had), and told Kenny that they were leaving as well, which only left Kyle and Cartman to stand there awkwardly to wait for their own parents.  
Kyle let out a sigh and began making his way over to the picnic area where the rest of the parents were still asleep. Gerald let a snort as he was angrily poked awake by his son, and he blinked sleepily for a few moments while looking around.  
“Oh, hey there, son,” he greeted. “I was just resting my eyes for a few moments.”  
“Dad, you’ve been out all day,” Kyle pointed out. “The sun’s already setting.”  
“Oh,” Gerald mumbled, clearly looking a bit embarrassed. “Why don’t you go find your brother then and we’ll leave?”  
Heart pounding, Cartman opened his mouth to offer to help look for him, but he was interrupted by his own mother calling his name as she made her way towards him. He frowned angrily at her when she caught up to them.  
“There you are, sweetie!” she said happily. “I’ve been looking for you! It’s time to go home now!”  
“But…” Cartman started to protest, but he was cut off as his mother started to drag him away, stating that she had dinner waiting for them and that it was his favorite. He desperately looked over his shoulder, but Kyle had already left to go find Ike, effectively ruining his argument that had been building in him.  
Cartman sat in silence on the way home, fuming with rage as Lianne happily sang along to some tune on the radio. When they arrived home, Cartman quickly told his mom that he had to do something before dinner. Then he ran up to his room, threw himself face first onto his bed and screamed as loud as he could into his pillow.

Somehow, that carnival hadn’t made anything less awkward (in fact, it seemed like everyone was on edge now after the fact), and barely anyone made any eye contact at school the next day. Only two people seemed to have any sort of smile on their faces, and they were Angela and Dr. Pidd. Honestly, Kenny was starting to get really sick of everyone’s gloomy mood.  
At lunch time, barely anyone spoke, except for Craig, who was muttering angrily under his breath and glaring at Clyde and Token, both of whom were completely unaware of Craig’s anger towards them at the moment, despite the fact that at some point he explicitly told them earlier that he wasn’t happy with them for barging in on his alone time with Tweek. Kenny silently wondered how dense someone could be to not notice when someone was angry with them like that, completely unaware that Cartman was narrowing his eyes angrily at him at the moment.  
Kenny found it hard to concentrate on anything during class, his mind on the problem with his friends. He hated how much Angela was getting her own way, and he desperately wanted to put a stop to it. Maybe it was time to pay that crazy doctor another visit. But there had to be a way to snoop through her office without her coming back this time.  
“Hey Kyle, you wanna sneak into Dr. Pidd’s office with me tonight?” he asked his friend, walking up to him. Kyle blinked in confusion at him.  
“And why would we want to do that?” he wondered.  
“So, we can dig up dirt on Angela and maybe figure out what the fuck is wrong with this therapist,” Kenny suggested. His friend continued to stare at him for a moment.  
“You really think it’s a good idea to sneak into school at night and go snooping around an office for information?” he clarified.  
“No, but honestly I have no better ideas and let’s face, we’re not going to come up with any,” Kenny replied, rolling his eyes. Kyle took a moment to think it over before letting out a sigh of defeat.  
“Yeah, why not?” he muttered. “It’s certainly not the worst thing we’ve ever done to drive the plot forward.”  
“Cool,” Kenny said, rubbing his hands together sinisterly. “I have a devious plan for breaking into that office! It’ll be dangerous and complicated! And convoluted and…”  
“We’re just going to climb through the window, aren’t we?” Kyle guessed, cocking an eyebrow at him. Kenny blinked, having about to go off on a tangent, and he looked down awkwardly after a moment.  
“Maybe,” he mumbled.

Even on the outside the school was rather creepy looking at night. Kenny and Kyle approached the building cautiously, as if afraid that it would suddenly come alive and eat them or something. They pressed themselves against the building, glancing into each window until they found the right room.  
Dr. Pidd must have been very trusting, or airheaded because the window in her office was wide open. The two boys glanced at each other before shuffling over to it.  
“Wait, this seems too easy,” Kenny muttered. “What if there’s a booby trap or something on the other side?”  
“Don’t worry, I’m way ahead of you,” Kyle replied. Before Kenny could ask him what his plan was, he bent down, grabbed his friend by the ankles and shoved him through the window. He waited for a moment before calling out, “We good?”  
“Yeah,” came Kenny’s muffled reply after a long moment. He was lying on his face when Kyle climbed in after him. He continued to lay there until Kyle crossed the room and turned on the lights.  
“So, what are we looking for, exactly?” Kyle asked, looking around the office.  
“Dr. Pidd keeps files of all her conversations she’s had with everyone,” Kenny explained. “If we find Angela’s file, we can show Stan all of the things she had been planning. Then he’ll see the truth.”  
“How do you know she told this doctor anything?” Kyle wondered. Kenny paused before answering, instead looking around at the cabinets.  
“I may have sneaked in here once before,” he mumbled. Kyle let out a sigh.  
“Well, that explains why you were spazzing out the other day,” he muttered under his breath. Kenny glared at him but didn’t respond as they cautiously moved around the office, trying not to make too much noise.  
Kenny tried to remember which cabinet Angela’s file had been in while Kyle went over to the therapist’s desk. There was a briefcase sitting on it, with the label “Dr. Q. Pidd.” Interested, he tried to open it, but found it locked. He looked through the drawers of the desk to try and find a key, but the doctor had been at least smart enough to take the key with her (he assumed) because he couldn’t find it anywhere. He gave up with a hiss of annoyance.  
“Are you having any luck, Kenny?” he asked, looking over to where Kenny was still yanking out cabinet drawers. His hooded friend didn’t turn around.  
“Not yet,” he said, desperation starting to sound in his voice. “I know it’s here somewhere.” With a sigh, Kyle hopped down from the desk chair and went over to help him look.  
There was absolutely no file organization whatsoever in any of the cabinets. It was like Dr. Pidd had her own system of organizing everyone that wasn’t alphabetical, and it made no sense. One kid’s file would be next to a totally random kid’s file and so on.  
“I think she might have let a monkey organize her files or something,” Kenny muttered mostly to himself. “I have no idea how I managed to find her file the first time.”  
“Not that it would help,” Kyle sighed. “Do you even remember Angela’s last name?”  
“Nope.”  
“Yeah, me neither.”  
They continued leafing through each file carefully and making slow work of it. Kenny had to constantly stop himself from opening everyone’s files and reading about what messed up things the doctor told their friends. They kept at it for over an hour, until finally Kyle suddenly spoke, almost startling Kenny with how quiet it had gotten.  
“Hey, I just found Stan’s file,” Kyle told him, pulling it out of the cabinet. Curiosity got the better of both of them and they took a moment to look inside. Stan had only one conversation with the quack doctor, but it was apparently enough.  
“Did that bitch really suggest to Stan that he try to kill me?” Kyle hissed. “What the fuck is wrong with this chick?!?”  
“Dude, this lady is messed up!” Kenny agreed. “There’s no way she could possibly be a licensed therapist. I really hope Clyde had talked some sense into him.”  
“There’s no way he could have believed her,” Kyle said hesitantly. “Is there?”  
They let the question hang in the air before Kyle closed the file and tossed it back into place. Almost immediately, they spotted Cartman’s file (which was much thicker than everyone else’s files). Kenny felt the air leave him as Kyle pulled out the file and wordlessly opened it. He wasn’t sure why, it wasn’t like there was anything embarrassing about him in there, but for some reason he found himself holding his breath.  
He was pretty sure if Kyle had been drinking something he would have spat it out, but he could see the color drain from his face. As if the file was on fire or was coming alive in his hand, Kyle quickly slammed the file shut and threw it violently back into the cabinet.  
“What?” Kenny said, pretending he didn’t know. “What did it say?”  
“Nothing,” Kyle replied quickly. “Just some more crazy shit this so-called doctor said.” He didn’t look his friend in the eye as he spoke. “So, are we going to find this stupid file or not? We’re wasting time.”  
Kenny blinked in surprise at him, but decided not to press the subject. He was about to turn to a different cabinet and start a new search, but a sound behind him made him stop dead in his tracks.  
“Looking for something?” said a familiar voice. The two of them whipped around to see Angela standing by the open window. She had a wicked grin on her face as she stared at them. To their horror, she was holding her own file in one hand, and slowly lighting it on fire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I was originally going to have them not find the file, give up and then go home only for to be revealed later that Angela had gotten her hands on it before they did, but I decided that this was more dramatic. And I really wanted to show the desperation of how their options are slowly running out.  
> Only one more chapter and then we’re finally going to find out what theme they chose for the dance. And then other stuff is going to happen. Like the climax! Yay! Sorry this chapter was a bit short, but this was one I didn’t really have a firm idea of what was going to happen, and I found this chapter kind of boring. Sorry about that.  
> Anyways, read and review, and remember, no hickies!


	20. Keep Calm and PANIC

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I am now officially free for the holidays, and so I’ll probably be able to finish this story before Valentine’s Day! Yay! Especially if I can get through this chapter where I literally have nothing planned for it! Yay? Seriously, even my notes won’t help because all I wrote was “stuff that happens while getting ready for the dance.” Past me was not kind to present me.  
> Anyways, that’s all I’ve got to say.
> 
> “Say, won’t you say forever, stay, if you stay forever, hey, we can stay forever young!”

Kyle and Kenny glanced from Angela, to the file burning in her hand, to the dementedly evil smile on her face. Kyle narrowed his eyes angrily at her while Kenny looked on in horror. For a long moment, none of them spoke.  
“You God-damned bitch!” Kyle snarled, hatred showing in every bit of his voice.  
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Kenny growled, trying to figure out if he could snatch the file out of her hand from where he was standing. Angela let out a laugh.  
“Come on, you didn’t honestly think I’d let you show Stan everything I’ve said to Dr. Pidd, did you?” she said, tossing the burning papers into the nearby trashcan. “Don’t you know I’m always going to be one step ahead of you? You can’t stop me, I always get what I want.”  
“You really think any of this is going to make me want to be with you?” Kyle wondered, his voice a dangerous growl. “All you’re doing is making me hate you more with each passing second.”  
She smiled sweetly at him, as if she couldn’t quite figure out what he was saying. She took a step forward and Kenny quickly moved to stand protectively in front of his friend.  
“Back off, bitch,” he growled at her. She glared at Kenny for a moment, then looked past him at Kyle, who continued to narrow his eyes at her.  
“It’s really funny how you think you have a choice in the matter,” she said threateningly. “But I’m going to win in the end. I always do. You’re going to find me irresistible.”  
Kyle didn’t reply, but bared his teeth angrily at her. Kenny slowly pulled back the hood of his own jacket so Angela could see the full impact of just how much he hated her. Angela looked taken aback by this, but from the anger on his face or the fact that she could actually see his face, he couldn’t tell.  
“Don’t. You. DARE. Threaten. My. Friends!” Kenny hissed through his teeth, emphasizing each word with all the anger he felt. He couldn’t see Kyle’s reaction since he was standing in front of him, but Angela looked actually a bit scared. She slowly backed herself towards the window, her fear turning back into anger.  
“Say what you want, but as I promised, before Valentine’s Day is over, you will be mine, my love,” she said, completely ignoring Kenny. “And now you have no proof! So, go ahead and tell Stan! I dare you!”  
Then, with a laugh, she climbed out the window and disappeared into the night. The two friends stood motionless for a long moment, breathing heavily as they let what had just happened slowly sink in. Then, Kenny silently pulled up his hood over his face and made his way over to the trash can. Unfortunately, all that was left of Angela’s file was smoldering ashes and bits of still burning paper.  
When he turned back around, Kyle had sunk to his knees and was staring at the floor in shock. Kenny let out a sigh and went over to sit down next to him. His friend was shaking slightly, but he couldn’t tell if it was from shock or rage.  
“That’s it,” Kyle muttered eventually. “Stan’s never going to forgive me.” He leaned into Kenny’s shoulder with a sigh. “I might as well just resign myself to my fate.”  
“That’s no way to talk,” Kenny said sternly. “The Kyle I know wouldn’t give up so easily. We’re going to find a way out of this mess. Angela managed to hoodwink Stan, but she hasn’t fooled anyone else! The rest of us believe you.”  
“Yeah, well unless that belief can magically fix everything or banish Angela to another planet, the rest of you don’t matter,” Kyle sighed, closing his eyes. “Fuck my life.”  
“We’ll figure something out,” Kenny promised. Kyle’s only response was to let out another sigh. “Come on, let’s get out of here before someone sees us.”  
They tried to arrange the office as best they could so that no one would know they had been there, but Dr. Pidd hadn’t been the best at organizing, so it didn’t really take them much effort. Kenny followed Kyle to his house without even realizing it, and was too lazy to go back to his own house, so he was glad when Kyle didn’t object to him staying over.  
They went up to his room, quickly passing Kyle’s parents before they could ask him where he’s been, and as soon as they got up there, Kyle went over and collapsed onto his bed. Kenny didn’t know what else to do, so he just sat down on the floor, whittling his thumbs awkwardly.  
There just had to be something more they could do, but Kenny couldn’t see what. He could try to talk Cartman into telling Stan what he had seen, but if Stan didn’t want to believe everything else that was painfully obvious, he didn’t see how this would change his mind. They needed hard evidence, but unfortunately Angela had destroyed it all. God, Kenny really hated that bitch.  
“Is it all right if I stay the night?” Kenny asked eventually. “It’s getting late and I really don’t feel like walking home in the dark.”  
“Sure, go ahead,” Kyle said into his pillow, muffling his voice. “I don’t care.”  
Kenny would have flashed him a smile, but there was no way he would have seen it, so instead he went over to his friend’s closet and pulled out the spare pillow and blanket. He wasn’t sure if he would be able to sleep, but he really didn’t care at the moment. His mind was wrapped around trying to find a solution to Kyle’s ever-growing problem.  
“So, how’s the decorating for the school dance coming?” Kenny decided to asking, trying to take his friend’s mind off of things. Kyle’s only reply was to groan into his pillow. Kenny let out a sigh. “I can’t believe any of you are actually decorating.”  
“We’re not really,” Kyle told him, turning to look at him. “It’s mostly the other grades doing the decorating. We’re in charge of catering and finding musical entertainment. I don’t know why they’re making us put so much effort into it. It’s just a stupid dance.”  
“What was the theme that you decided on?” Kenny wondered. “I don’t think you ever told me.”  
“I didn’t,” his friend said. “Anyways, it doesn’t really matter. I don’t think I’m going to go to the stupid thing anyways.”  
“Why not?” Kenny asked, raising his eyebrows in mild surprise.  
“Because I really don’t want to watch Angela try to make me jealous by making out with my best friend the entire time,” Kyle sighed. “And it’s a Valentine’s Day dance. It’s going to be stupid, I just know it.”  
“The theme you picked couldn’t have been that bad,” Kenny defended. Kyle glared at him but didn’t say anything more.

The next day was just as bad as the last few weeks, if not worse. Angela had become smugger than ever before, and a sour mood had descended upon the rest of the school. The fourth graders seemed to have become zombies, wandering around as empty shells. Even some of the teachers had lost their will to live. Dr. Pidd, on the other hand, seemed unaffected, walking around the halls with the same creepy smile on her face that she always wore.  
It didn’t help that both Kyle and Kenny were exhausted from the night before. Kenny didn’t think he had gotten a wink of sleep, despite the fact that Kyle’s room was ten times nicer than his own, and it was already affecting his temper. He hated to think what toll it had taken on Kyle, since the red head had complained about not being able to sleep for days before.  
The two of them were at their lockers at the end of the day, still at a loss of what to do. Neither of them had really spoken for the entire day, and Kenny noticed that Kyle wasn’t willing to look anyone in the eye. Kenny was just about to ask Kyle if he could come over to his house, when he heard his friend take a sharp breath and shift closer to him. He looked up to see Cartman making his way towards them and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kyle immediately avert his gaze to the floor.  
“Hey, what are you guys up to?” Cartman wondered when he reached them.  
“Nothing,” Kenny replied, trying to keep his tone light. “We’re just trying to figure out what to do about Angela.”  
“Oh, I can think of several things to do about Angela,” Cartman sighed. “Unfortunately, none of them are legal.” Kenny rolled his eyes. They weren’t getting anywhere.  
“I just wish there was some way to prove that she was a backstabbing bitch,” Kenny replied. “Or just do something to get Stan to realize he’s being an idiot.” He thought about it for a long moment. “Maybe there’s something we can do at the dance.”  
“Ok, I seriously doubt that,” Cartman scoffed. “And I thought we decided that we weren’t going to go to that stupid dance. It’s going to be lame.”  
“We didn’t decide on anything,” Kenny pointed out.  
“That reminds me,” Cartman carried on as if he hadn’t spoken and turning to Kyle. “Since apparently, we’re in charge of snacks and stuff, we have to go to the store and pick ‘Valentine themed’ food or some bullshit like that.”  
Kyle flinched and still managed to not look at either of them. “Just the two of us?” he asked. “When was that decided?” Cartman gave him a confused look.  
“A couple days ago,” he answered. “Remember? Our group was put in charge of getting food and beverages, and the entertainment, and then we said we would do it because the other three were refusing to volunteer.”  
“Oh yeah,” Kyle muttered, staring down at the floor again. Kenny looked over at him before turning to Cartman.  
“I’ll go with you guys,” he said, trying to sound nonchalant about it. “The school gave you a budget, right? I have a few things I need to pick up anyways and I was kind of hoping to sneak them into your guys’ cart so I don’t have to pay for it.”  
Cartman narrowed his eyes at him. “I’m pretty sure that’s illegal,” he pointed out. Kenny shrugged in response.  
“And you’re point is?” he said. Cartman let out a sigh.  
“Fine,” he muttered. “You poor people and your poor people needs. I’m only letting you do this because I couldn’t give a shit.”  
Kenny frowned at him and was about to come up with a great comeback, but he was interrupted by Wendy coming up to them with a friendly greeting. Kenny had noticed that she seemed to be hanging out with the three of them more than her own friends lately. He wasn’t sure why; maybe it was their mutual hatred for Angela or something.  
“What are you guys doing?” she asked when all of the greetings were over with.  
“We were planning on going to the store to pick up stuff for that stupid dance,” Cartman answered. Wendy cocked her head slightly, considering it.  
“Can I come with?” she asked after a moment. “I wanted to get your guys’ opinion on something anyways.” The three of them glanced at each other.  
“Sure, come along,” Kyle answered quickly before Cartman could ask her why didn’t she just volunteer in the first place.  
“What did you need our professional opinions on anyways?” Kenny asked when they had gathered all their stuff and made their way out of the building. Wendy let out a sigh.  
“Well, despite my better judgement, I decided I’ll go to the dance anyways, and Bebe won’t stop bugging me about dressing up to match the theme,” Wendy explained.  
“What’s the theme?” Kenny asked. She ignored him.  
“Thing is, I have a couple of dresses that could work, and I was hoping you guys could help me pick one,” she stated.  
“And why would you want us to do that?” Cartman wondered, cocking an eyebrow.  
“Because girlfriends just gush over everything and never decide on anything like this because they don’t want to hurt your feelings,” Wendy pointed out. “Guys are way more honest about stuff like this. Even when they don’t think they are.” With a wink, she added, “It’s all in their expression.”  
“Yeah, well, no offense, but I’d rather do anything else,” Cartman said.  
“Me too,” Kenny agreed. Wendy frowned at them before turning big, puppy dog eyes towards Kyle, who gave a long sigh after a moment.  
“I have bad feeling about this,” he muttered under his breath. In a louder voice he added, “Fine.” Wendy flashed him a knowing grin and didn’t say anything more as they entered the store.

The trip to the market had been awkward enough, but then Kyle and Wendy split from the other two afterwards, Wendy forcing him to come to her house immediately because apparently the whole “trying on dresses” thing couldn’t wait. She forced him to wait on her couch while she went upstairs to change, stating that her parents would have a panic attack if she brought him to her room for even a second. She showed off three dresses and ended up going with the second one, because that was the one that rendered Kyle the most speechless.  
Kyle left her house about an hour later, his hands in his pockets and staring at the ground as he made his way towards his own house. He was almost to his doorstep when he heard his name being called from behind him. He barely managed to turn around before somebody suddenly slammed into him, tackling him to the ground. Taken by surprise, he had his shoulders pinned in a matter of seconds and whoever tackled him was sitting on his chest, making it very hard to breathe. In the dimming light, Kyle could barely make out who had suddenly attacked him.  
“Stan?” he managed to gasp out. “Are you insane? What the fuck are you doing!?!”  
“Don’t give me that bullshit!” Stan snarled, glaring down at him. “I finally figured out what’s going on here! You’ve been dating Wendy behind my back!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoa! Where did that come from? And why am I ending the chapter here? Because I’m a dick, that’s why! Anyways, we’ll see how Kyle takes this accusation, and then we’ll finally find out what’s going to be the theme of the dance! And more awkwardness will ensue, so that will be fun.  
> I only have six more chapters before this story is complete! Yay! And then we can move on to the sequel! I might be able to finish this story before Valentine’s Day, but I seriously doubt it. So, as always, tell me what you think and make sure to tip the waiter out of the window with as much generosity as you can muster!


	21. I've Heard it Both Ways

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, for this chapter, the band that’s being booked for the dance is a band I created for the novel I’m writing. The band leader is a sassy demon named Reeah (but no one knows she’s actually a demon). She’s not a main character, but I thought it would be fun to include her and her band in this. Just so you know where they came from.  
> Anyways, why is Stan acting like a jackass? I don’t know, why don’t you read the chapter and find out? Also, we’re finally going to begin this stupid dance, so that should be fun!
> 
> “Singing Radiohead at the top of our lungs, with the boom box blaring as we’re falling in love! Got a bottle of whatever, but it’s getting us drunk, singing Here’s to never growing up!”

If Kyle hadn’t read the conversation Stan had with Dr. Pidd, he would have burst out laughing. Now he had the very real fear that Stan was going to try and kill him. Right in front of his own house. He was still glaring down at Kyle, waiting for him to respond to this accusation, but it was kind of hard to think when the air was being pressed out of his lungs.  
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Kyle managed to gasp eventually. “What on earth would make you think that I’m dating Wendy?”  
“I’m not blind, I’ve seen the looks you share,” Stan snarled at him. “And you two have been hanging out more than usual! I just saw you leaving and walking home from her house!”  
Kyle frowned up at him, and an anger started burning in his chest. “Not that it’s any of your fucking business, but Wendy needed my opinion on something,” he growled, narrowing his eyes. “And if you were paying any god damn attention, you’d notice that she hangs out with Cartman and Kenny just as much as she does with me.”  
Stan blinked uncertainly. “But…” he started to say. But, he was cut off when Kyle, in his own building anger, shoved Stan right off of him and threw him onto his back. He was surprised when he felt his own shoulders being pinned to the ground, and Kyle’s face was inches from his own, glaring furiously down at him and breathing heavily.  
“How many times do I have to fucking tell you?” Kyle hissed in his face. “I’m not going to date my best friend’s ex-girlfriend, no matter how wrong he is! I’m not dating Wendy, I never have dated her, and I never will date her!”  
Stan stared up in surprise at him, but it wasn’t from his harsh words. It was the fact that he could see tears starting to form in Kyle’s eyes, and the fact that he was shaking violently. All of his anger immediately left him, leaving him an empty shell.  
“I lost my best friend,” Kyle snarled at him, anger still burning in his eyes. “She lost her boyfriend! Why on earth would you think we would fuck it up further for ourselves?”  
Stan couldn’t bear to look Kyle in the eye. He couldn’t tell him what he really thought now. Or that it was Angela’s suggestion. Not that he needed to say anything, because Kyle narrowed his eyes at him a moment later and his lips drew back into a snarl.  
“You think I’m trying to make Angela jealous, don’t you?” he snapped, sitting up straight. “I can’t believe you honestly still believe that I would like that bitch! I thought you were smarter than that, but I guess I was wrong.”  
“Kyle,” Stan tried to say, but Kyle had heard enough.  
“You know what, Stan?” he hissed, standing up. “You don’t want to believe the obvious truth, then fine! You’re going to look like a total idiot when you realize that you’re the only one who doesn’t believe me and your fake relationship eventually crashes and burns! And you better not come crying to me when that happens!”  
Then, before Stan could answer, Kyle angrily turned on his heel and stormed into his own house, slamming the door hard behind him. Stan lay outside for a long time, letting the argument wash over him as he stared blankly up at the sky. Then, he slowly pulled himself up and dejectedly made his way to his own house. He quickly ran up to his room, calling to his mom that he wasn’t hungry when she asked, and threw himself onto his bed before he finally let the tears he had been holding back flow from his eyes.

The next day was the day before the dance, and things could not have been looking any grimmer. Kenny and Cartman could immediately see the sleep deprivation on both Stan and Kyle’s faces. What confused everyone was that now it seemed that Kyle was angrier at Stan than Stan was at him. And both of them refused to tell anyone why that was.  
The only one of the fourth graders that seemed excited for the dance was Butters, but even he refused to say what theme they picked, because the others had convinced him that they had to make it a surprise. So, absolutely no one else in the fourth grade knew what the theme of the dance was going to be.  
Stan slumped through the halls after class, looking for someone to talk to who would understand. He turned the corner to see his three friends and Wendy in a small group, talking in low voices. He let out a sigh, feeling his heart start to break, then started to make his way over to them. But, he didn’t get very far before he felt someone grab his arm and begin to pull him in the opposite direction.  
“Come on, Stan,” Angela was saying in a loud voice. “You have to walk me home! It will be so romantic!”  
“But…” Stan started to protest, but his argument was lost on her, and he was quickly pulled away.  
Out of the corner of his eye, Kyle watched them go, and he couldn’t help but narrow his eyes at how little resistance Stan put up to being dragged away by his bitch of a girlfriend. He turned back to the others, having not really paid attention to their conversation.  
“I wouldn’t be surprised if Dr. Pidd was really a brain washing witch,” Wendy was saying (apparently Kenny had been telling her all of the advice that the guys had been given). “Apparently she hinted to Bebe that she should follow Twilight’s example and throw herself off of something to get her crush’s attention.”  
“That’s horrible!” Kenny said, his eyes widening. “Who’s her crush?”  
“That’s none of your business,” Wendy snapped at him. “And Nichole told me that Dr. Pidd suggested to her that she should burn Token’s house down.”  
Kenny and Cartman exchanged confused glances, but before either of them could ask why, or tell her that Token had gotten the same exact advice, Kyle let out a long sigh.  
“Can we talk about something else?” he asked them, staring at the ground. He didn’t really want to think about the crazy doctor or the insane, homicidal things she had been telling all of their friends. Or what he had read in both Stan and Cartman’s files. “I mean, we all know she’s terrible at her job. There’s not much else we can do about it.”  
Cartman blinked at him before responding. “We need to go to the store,” he stated. “To get snacks for the dance.” Kyle gave him a sideways glare.  
“We did that yesterday,” he pointed out with a slight growl to his voice. Cartman shuffled his feet slightly, not looking at him.  
“Yeah, but the candy’s all gone,” he said to a chorus of annoyed groans.  
“Ok, so Cartman’s no longer in charge of the food,” Wendy decided, rolling her eyes.  
Cartman glared at her but didn’t argue with the fact that this was definitely for the best. He opened his mouth to say something else, but Kyle had already turned and started walking away. His friends blinked in surprise and started following him. Cartman could see him stiffen as they fell in step with him.  
“Stan seemed kind of different today,” Kenny ventured, deciding not to ask why Kyle had just rudely started walking away from them without a word. Kyle let out a sigh.  
“Guys, I really just want to be alone for a while,” he told them, not acknowledging Kenny’s statement.  
“Do you know what happened with him?” Wendy asked, ignoring his words.  
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Kyle snapped. He let out a slight hiss when Cartman and Wendy pressed themselves against him. Neither of them moved away. “Will you guys please just leave me alone?”  
Wendy smiled slyly at him before leaning over and kissing him on the cheek. “Nope,” she replied. “You’re stuck with us.” He rolled his eyes in response.  
Kyle knew that the three of them were just trying to make him feel better. But they really weren’t helping that fact when they just decided to follow him all the way home. Well, they weren’t going to get anything from him. He was just determined to stay pissed off.  
What didn’t help matters was the fact that Stan was blowing up his phone with text messages. Yesterday, he would have done anything to have Stan talk to him again, but now he just ignored his phone, not even looking at the messages.  
He didn’t want to admit to Stan that Wendy had tried to get him to fake date her simply to make Stan jealous. From the way he was acting, Stan would probably just assume that Wendy had broken Kyle down, and he didn’t need Stan to be mad at Wendy as well. And maybe he was still too angry about last night, but for some reason he didn’t want to tell his friends about Stan’s accusation either.  
The next day was Valentine’s Day as well as the dance, and it was perhaps the most awkward Valentine’s Day the school had ever known. The fourth grade wasn’t quite past the point where handing out Valentine cards was considered stupid or lame, but nobody in the class seemed to be in a very giving mood. It wasn’t surprising; apparently half the class had been told by Dr. Pidd to murder or maim the other half of the class in some way.  
Mr. Garrison ended class by stating that he hoped to see most of his students at the dance that night, and the class let out a collective groan. No one really wanted to go to the dance, but nearly all of their parents were making them go so they could have alone time with each other. Then the bell rang and everyone began to slump away.  
Kyle quickly gathered up his things, ignoring whoever was calling his name, and quickly left the room, wondering if he should bother going to his locker. He heard rushing feet, and he didn’t need to turn around to know that Kenny and Cartman had caught up to him. He stiffened and slowed his step when he felt Cartman press lightly against him.  
Kenny started to say something, but he cut himself short when they heard a familiar voice calling to them. Kyle considered not even turning around to face Stan, but something told him that he wasn’t going to leave him alone until he did. He took a half step away from Cartman before whipping around to glare at his former best friend.  
“What do you want, Stan?” he growled at him. “Have you come to accuse me of something else now? You going to try and make it sound like I tried to sleep with your mom too?”  
Stan blinked in surprise at him, his mouth slightly open as if he had been about to say something, but all his words had been caught in his throat. Kenny and Cartman also couldn’t help but stare in shock at his sudden outburst. Anger and hurt were still blazing in his green eyes as he waited for Stan to speak.  
“I-I’m sorry for accusing you of dating Wendy,” he stuttered after a moment. “I just wasn’t thinking straight. I was mad, and I guess I was just looking for any excuse to be angry.”  
Kyle’s face didn’t soften. “Why do you care what Wendy does anyways?” he hissed at him. “You’re dating someone else, if you can even call it that! You can’t let her move on if you keep dangling hope over her like that!”  
“I’m not!” Stan defended himself. “Or at least, I’m not trying to. I want her to be happy too. But why should she care about who I date? She broke up with me!”  
“Why don’t you ask her yourself instead of accusing me of bullshit all the time?” Kyle snarled. Stan rubbed his shoulder awkwardly.  
“I was actually planning on talking to her tonight at the dance about it,” he admitted with a mumble. “And I knew you guys have been hanging out with her a lot, so I was hoping you could help me.”  
Immediately, Kyle’s look of rage was replaced with one of sheer terror, and he exchanged a panicked look with Cartman.  
“Actually, we were just thinking that the four of us could just ditch the dance,” Kyle told him frantically. “It’s not going to be all that fun anyways.”  
“Yeah,” Cartman agreed. “And where does it say that we have to go to some stupid dance anyways? None of us like dances and what do we have to look forward to? Some crappy food and standing awkwardly in the corner?”  
“Relax, you two,” Stan sighed, rolling his eyes. “I’m sure the theme you picked can’t be that bad!”

“Seriously?” Stan said slowly, staring at what had been done to the gym in disbelief while Kyle and Cartman both stood with their heads in their hands. “This was the theme you guys chose? Out of all the things you could have picked, you chose a Disney theme?”  
“That has got to be the lamest, most idiotic dance theme idea ever!” Kenny added, shaking his head.  
“We know,” their two friends hissed at the same time.  
“Why would you guys go with Disney of all things?” Stan wondered. Kyle glared at him.  
“It wasn’t our fault,” he defended himself. “At the meetings, Butters was the only one who was coming up with ideas. Wendy and Angela were at each other’s throats, and Cartman and I didn’t care, so he just came up with an idea himself!”  
“Yeah, but weren’t all the grades supposed to come together and vote on the best idea?” Kenny wondered. “Surely the fifth and sixth graders wouldn’t have voted for it.”  
“They probably wouldn’t have if they had actually shown up,” Cartman said, rolling his eyes. “The only ones who showed up for that stupid voting thing was us and the kindergarteners.”  
“Yeah, and once Butters said the word ‘Disney’ they wouldn’t hear any other idea,” Kyle muttered, still ashamed that he was forced to be a part of the entire thing.  
“Wow,” Stan replied. “You guys really blew it, didn’t you?” Neither of them responded to that, but instead stared daggers at their friend.  
“Well, we did manage to get a band…” Kyle started, but Stan interrupted him.   
“Oh, please don’t tell me you guys got Puke Street!” he sighed.  
“No, we didn’t,” Kyle growled. “We got Devil’s in the Details.”  
Stan and Kenny stared in surprise. “You actually managed to get Devil’s in the Details?” Kenny said in shock. “How the fuck did you manage to pull that off?”  
“I have a friend in New York who knows the lead singer, Reeah,” Kyle explained. “She gives her voice lessons and they’re good friends, so she asked if they’d come play for us.”  
“Who do you know from New York?” Kenny wondered.  
“Wait, your friend is a girl?” Cartman added, bewildered.  
“There’s no way you actually got Devil’s in the Details,” Stan said in disbelief.  
Kyle opened his mouth to reply to their comments, but at that moment, a tall, dark skinned woman with chin length, bright purple hair and blue highlights, wearing a halter top, ankle length dark purple dress came walking up to them with four other people trailing behind her. They were all wearing devil horns and wings, and the woman had a devil tail that seemed to move on its own.  
“Hey,” she greeted in a warm voice. She looked the four of them over and her eyes rested on Kyle, who she grinned at. “You’re Kyle Broflovski, aren’t you? Brooke told me about you when she asked us to play here.”  
Kyle couldn’t help but grin at the shocked expressions on his friends’ faces. “That’s right,” he told her. She held out a fist for a fist bump, which he accepted.  
“Thanks for having us,” the woman said. “I’m Reeah, and these are my band mates. We’ll make sure this dance is the best dance ever.” She turned to the rest of the devils. “Come on, guys, let’s go set up.”  
Then they walked away, lugging equipment over to the stage that had been set up.  
“Wow,” was all Kenny could say.  
“Yeah, most famous bands think it’s beneath them to play at a school dance,” Kyle explained with a hint of smugness to his voice. “But my friend told me how the Devils believe that any publicity is good, and even have a low rate for schools.”  
“You think I could get their autographs?” Kenny asked, still staring in awe.  
Kyle opened his mouth to reply, but at that moment, Reeah stepped up to the mike and the entire gym started to quiet down as people started to realize who was on stage.  
“All right, South Park,” Reeah greeted, flashing her surprisingly pointy fangs. “It’s great to be here! We are Devil’s in the Details, and we’re here to make sure you all have the night of your lives!” There was a loud cheer. “We’ll be setting up a request box because apparently our own songs are ‘too graphic for the children,’ and because our fucking songs have too much god-damn swearing in it. So, unfortunately, you’ll have to settle for mostly shit other people wrote, but I think you’ll have fun anyways.”  
A lot of the teachers looked appalled at this last statement. The band quickly finished setting up, and Reeah picked up her own guitar before stepping back up to the mike.  
“Ok, this first one goes out to the kid who invited us here,” Reeah announced. She winked in Kyle’s direction. “This one’s for you, babe.”  
Then the band took up their instruments and began to play Avril Lavene’s “Here’s to Never Growing Up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think you’ll be surprised to learn that I like the song “Here’s to Never Growing Up.” Wait, you weren’t surprised? Well, how did you know then?  
> Anyways, how many of you managed to guess the theme? Next time, we’ll see what Wendy decided to dress up as, and then drama will happen and everything will start to go downhill. It will be fun.


	22. I Saw What You Did for a Klondike Bar

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, might as well start the next chapter. This is where things start to get good. And we’ll get to see all of our favorite characters act awkward at the dance. Some stuff is going to happen, and then other stuff is going to happen. Tweek and Craig are gonna be super adorable. It’s going to be great.  
> Also, I’m back in school now, so I might not be able to update as much right now. I’ll hopefully try to finish this before Valentine’s Day, but don’t count on it.
> 
> “We’ll be running down the street yelling “Kiss my ass!” I’m like yeah, whatever, we’re still living like that! When the sun’s going down we’ll be raising our cups singing here’s to never growing up!”

The moment the song ended, everyone broke into applause. The band soaked it in before launching into the next song and people started getting more comfortable with each other. Stan stopped applauding before turning to see that his friends had already scattered.  
Kenny had made an immediate beeline for the refreshment table and was currently piling food onto a paper plate. Stan could see Cartman on the other side of the gym, talking to Token; but he saw no sign of Kyle. He instantly became nervous at the sight of Wendy, however, when he saw her nearby, talking to Nichole and Bebe.  
Wendy was dressed as Jasmine from Aladdin, looking as beautiful as ever. Nichole was dressed as Tiana from the Princess and the Frog, while Bebe was looking like Cinderella. Not that Stan really noticed the other two at the moment. He was wondering if he was brave enough to go over there and try to talk to her yet, but then his attention was taken by Angela approaching him, dressed as Anna.  
“There you are, Stan!” she greeted him, smiling sweetly. “I’ve been looking all over for you! What are you doing just standing by yourself?”  
“Um…I was looking for you,” Stan muttered, not really sure of himself. She let out a cutesy giggle and suddenly grabbed his hand, dragging him towards the dance floor.  
“Come on, Stan! Let’s dance!” she insisted, ignoring his protests.  
Out of the corner of her eye, Wendy watched them go and let out a sigh, barely paying attention to whatever Bebe was talking about. She wasn’t going to have fun at this dance, she could just tell. Why did she let Bebe talk her in to going? She knew what she was going to see, and yet she still couldn’t handle it.  
“Wendy!” Bebe said suddenly, waving a hand in front of her face and snapping her out of her thoughts. Wendy gave a start and turned to her.  
“What?” she wondered.  
“I was asking you if you wanted Nichole and me to take the bitch outside and beat her to death,” Bebe told her, nodding in Angela’s direction. Wendy let out another sigh.  
“No, it’s fine,” she replied, not quite sure if Bebe was being serious or not, but not wanting to take the chance. “I want to win Stan back fair and square.” Deciding to indulge to them a bit, she suddenly gave her friends a mischievous glance. “Besides, if anyone’s going to beat her to death, it’s going to be me.”  
Nichole laughed and patted her on the shoulder. “That’s more like it,” she said, smiling. “There’s the Wendy we know and love. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go aggressively make out with my boyfriend.”  
Then she stalked away, disappearing into the crowd and reappearing next to Token and Cartman before dragging Token away. Wendy and Bebe watched her before turning back towards the stage with a fit of giggles.  
“So, do you want to get your dance on now or later?” Bebe asked, turning to her friend. “Personally, I need the right song before I can get my dance on.”  
“Who uses the phrase ‘get their dance on’ anymore?” Wendy wondered, cocking her head.  
“I do,” Bebe said. “When do we want to get our dance on?”  
“Stop saying that!” Wendy laughed.  
They turned back to the stage where the band was looking through the already filled suggestion box for song requests. Wendy noticed that Reeah and her band had three main reactions to everyone’s notes. They either looked totally disgusted, laughed at how stupid the song or message was, or simply went “aw!”  
For one song request, the band read it over for a moment before letting out a particularly long “Awwwwwww!” and then Reeah stepped up to the mike as her band got ready for the next song.  
“Ok, so this next one is dedicated to ‘My precious boo, Tweek,’” Reeah read out loud. Immediately, Wendy could see Tweek start to turn red and stop in his tracks. “With all the love in the world, Craig.” Bebe and Wendy couldn’t help but let out their own “aw!” at these words, and as The Devils began playing “These Words,” Wendy noticed Craig nearby, leaning against a wall and looking exceptionally proud of himself. There were a lot more “Aw!”s going through the gym as they sang.  
Wendy couldn’t see Tweek’s expression from where she was standing, but she could see how cherry red his face was before he buried it into Kyle’s arm, who was standing next to him. She imagined that Tweek was happy, because Kyle smiled before saying something to him (though she was too far away to make out what they were saying).  
“I don’t think Tweek likes being the center of attention,” Wendy commented to Bebe, who was watching with tears in her eyes.  
“Well, I had to do something to get his attention,” Craig said dismissively, walking by and obviously overhearing her. He went over to stand next to Tweek and Kyle as the Devils continued to sing their song, casually linking an arm through his boyfriend’s. Both Craig and Kyle were taken off guard when Tweek suddenly threw himself at Craig, throwing his arms around him and kissing him deeply. They were pretty sure some people clapped.  
Kyle grinned at them before walking away to give them a bit of privacy. He spotted Kenny near the refreshment table and made his way over to him. Kenny barely acknowledged him since he was trying to shovel everything on his plate into his mouth at once.  
“I’m not saving you if you start to choke,” Kyle warned him, watching with a look of slight disgust on his face. Kenny glared at him.  
“Some friend you are,” he growled good naturedly. “I have to say, they did do a good job at decorating this place. It’s like I’m we’re in Disneyland or something.” Kyle rolled his eyes in response.  
“It’s not that great,” he said. “I mean, at least it’s not completely lame. Just mildly.”  
“Why did you come if you were just going to complain the entire time anyways?” Kenny wondered, glancing at him. Kyle glared at him.  
“Because my parents forced me to,” he snapped. “Ike was super excited about coming and they told me that I had to keep an eye on him. So, I’m not allowed to leave until he’s ready to leave.”  
“Where is Ike anyways?” Kenny asked.  
“I have no idea,” Kyle replied, looking like he couldn’t care less. Kenny stared in confusion at him as he casually grabbed a glass of punch off the table before turning back to him. He opened his mouth to say something, but Kyle suddenly stiffened as he stared out at the dance floor, and he turned to see what had startled him, only to see Cartman slowly making his way over to where they were.  
“Where have you been?” Kenny wondered as Cartman reached them.  
“Well, I was talking to Token,” Cartman replied, pressing lightly against Kyle, who took a half step away from him. “But then Nichole just came up and rudely dragged him away in the middle of our conversation.” He gave Kenny a suspicious glance. “Have you moved from that spot at all?”  
“Nope,” Kenny replied, looking quite proud of himself. Cartman rolled his eyes before going over to the refreshment table and piling nearly everything onto a plate. He glanced out at the dance floor as he returned to his friends.  
“Is that girl dancing with Clyde the same one who forced him onto the Tunnel of Love, or is it someone else entirely?” he asked, nodding towards the dance floor. Kyle and Kenny both looked over to where he was indicating. Sure enough, they could see Clyde completely pinned to a girl who was dressed like Maleficent, looking absolutely terrified as he was swung around the dance floor.  
“You know,” Kenny said after a moment. “I can’t really tell.”  
Cartman snickered at the sight for a while before turning to his friends again. “Anyways, have you guys seen Stan at all?” he wondered. “I need to tell him something.”  
“He’s been dancing with the bitch all night,” Kyle snarled suddenly. “Good luck trying to pry them apart.”  
Cartman gave him a sympathetic look. “Then I’m gonna need a crowbar,” he joked before stalking off.  
The music had started to slow down some now. People were now a lot more comfortable and mingling around, and it was starting to get impossible to know where anyone was unless they were standing right next to them. Teachers were walking around, forcing students apart whenever they felt like it.  
Wendy watched the scene, still in the same spot with Bebe, but now Heidi and Red had joined them. She watched Stan and Angela dance with a sad sigh. She had an idea, but she was a little hesitant on what to do. Well, it was now or never, and she really couldn’t stand around and listen to Bebe call her ex-boyfriend a “bitch ass whore fuck” all night. And they hadn’t even danced at this dance yet.  
She spotted Kyle and Kenny standing next to the refreshment table, leaning against the wall and looking incredibly bored. She bid Bebe a quick farewell and made her way over to them. They both looked up in surprise at her as she approached them.  
“Hey Kyle,” she greeted. “Will you share this next dance with me?” Kyle blinked at her.  
“No,” he replied. “Stan’s mad enough at me already, I don’t need him to get the wrong idea…again.” Wendy rolled her eyes with a sigh.  
“I’m not trying to make Stan jealous anymore,” she told him. “I just thought we could dance together as friends. Is that so wrong?” Kyle narrowed his eyes at her.  
“Just as friends?” he clarified. Wendy nodded.  
“Just as friends,” she repeated. Kyle thought it over for a moment, then let out a long sigh.  
“Fine,” he replied. Kenny started snickering at the idea, but stopped short when Wendy turned to him.  
“You’re next,” she warned him before grabbing Kyle’s arm and leading him out onto the dance floor. The songs that had started playing were the slow dance songs (being played by the DJ because the band had gone on break because they “didn’t believe in slow songs”), which had forced a lot of the kids to let out a groan and walk away.  
“You just had to pick a slow dance song, didn’t you?” Kyle grumbled as Wendy turned to face him. He stood there awkwardly for a moment as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, not quite sure where to put his hands. Wendy giggled at his awkwardness.  
“You can put your hands around my waist, you know,” she told him. “I promise I won’t mind.” Kyle glared at her but did it anyways.   
Most of the dancers that were left on the dance floor were older kids trying to score with their dates, Stan and Angela (who ignored them), and Tweek and Craig. Tweek was swinging Craig around to completely different music that must have been going much faster in his own mind because there wasn’t a slow step to be found with the way Tweek was dancing. And Craig wasn’t so much as dancing as he was just hanging on for dear life. But gosh darn it, Tweek looked like he was having the time of his life swinging Craig around like a rag doll. And he gave no indication that he was going to slow down his dancing any time soon.  
Kyle and Wendy stayed mostly in a corner of the dance floor, not really wanting to draw attention to themselves, and trying to ignore that fact that Wendy’s friends were probably whispering about them at the moment.  
“You know ‘just friends’ don’t usually dance to slow dance songs,” Kyle pointed out. Wendy rolled her eyes.  
“Did you want to make out instead?” she asked him, smiling innocently. He blinked in shock at her, trying to decide if she was being serious or not.  
“What? No!” he said at last. She couldn’t help but laugh at his reaction, burying her face into his chest to hide her smile. She could hear him take a sharp breath, and his heartbeat sped up with nervousness.  
They continued dancing while trying not to look each other in the eye, and Wendy noticed that in the other corner Stan and Angela had stopped dancing and were now just making out. She let out a sigh and tried not cry, but a single tear rolled down her cheek.  
“It’s not going to last,” Kyle told her, noticing where she was staring. “That Angela is a bitch. A double-crossing, back stabbing bitch.”  
“I know,” Wendy replied. “But it’s like she has Stan under a spell or something. He never stared at me like that when we were dating, that’s for sure.”  
“She’s not even that good looking,” Kyle said. “I mean, she’s kind of cute, but in the standard, nothing-stands-out-about-her-in-any-way sort of way.”  
“Yeah, and what’s with her nose?” Wendy giggled. “You could go spelunking with how large it is. And she thinks she’s so hot just because she has a curvy figure.”  
“It doesn’t help that her laugh is so obnoxious,” Kyle added. “I mean, have you heard her try to laugh naturally? It sounds like a witch’s cackle.”  
“That’s because she is a witch,” Wendy said with a wink and they couldn’t help but laugh at that.  
Wendy didn’t know how it happened. She kept trying to tell herself later on that it was simply to make Stan jealous, but she knew the truth. As she and Kyle continued to make fun of Angela, and the music grew, she found herself swept up in the moment. And then she found herself kissing Stan’s best friend. Right the fuck out of nowhere.  
It took a very long moment for Wendy to realize that she was kissing Kyle, but when she finally did, for some reason instead of immediately pulling back, she kissed him deeper. Kyle had completely frozen against her, panic filling his mind. Hating herself more and more, she used her mouth to force his open, and she gently slid her tongue into his mouth. She felt his breath begin to become shallower as she kissed him deeper. Her own heart pounded against her chest, but for some reason she continued to kiss him as deeply as possible.  
She wrapped her arms tighter around him as she leaned into him. She could almost feel people turning to look at them, but she didn’t seem to care at the moment, exploring Kyle’s mouth with her tongue, and pressing closer to him every second.  
Keeping her arms wrapped around his shoulders, perhaps to keep others from seeing, she eventually stopped kissing him long enough to move down and begin kissing his neck. He immediately started shivering at her touch as she more aggressively moved her mouth around his throat.  
“Wendy,” she heard him breathe. “Stop!”  
Only then did she snap out of it and pulled back to look at him, startled. He was staring in complete shock at her, and she could feel her cheeks turning red.  
“Sorry,” she mumbled. “I got a little…carried away.” That, and the author had a sick sense of humor, but that wasn’t important right now. Kyle didn’t speak, and continued to just stare at her with wide eyes. Feeling extremely embarrassed and self-conscious, Wendy looked down at the floor as she took Kyle’s arm and led him back to where Kenny was waiting for them.  
Kenny was also staring in shock as they approached, and for some reason his plate was now on the floor, and his punch had spilled before his feet, and yet he had a pose if he still thought he was holding both. All three of them refused to speak for a moment.  
“Man, you are so lucky you guys were dancing near a corner,” Kenny commented eventually. “I think only your girlfriends, Tweek, Craig and I saw that.”  
“Oh great,” Wendy grumbled. “My girls are never going to let me live this down.” She looked up at Kenny and gave him a smile. “So, you ready for your dance now?”  
Kenny blinked in fear at her, and he immediately looked uncertain. “You’re not going to make out with me too, are you?” he asked after a moment.  
“I make no promises,” Wendy replied as she grabbed his arm and started dragging him towards the middle of the dance floor.  
Kyle watched them go, feeling a moment of relief that it appeared Kenny was right about hardly anyone noticing. He was planning on just standing there and watching to see if Wendy really would make out with Kenny, but then he heard his name being called. He felt his blood run cold as he slowly turned to see Stan stalking towards him. His expression was unreadable, but anger radiated off of him.  
For a moment, all Kyle could do was stand there as Stan made his way over to him. Then his brain caught up and he did the one thing he could think of at the moment. He turned on his heel and ran out of the gym. Only the sound of quickened feet and Stan’s voice calling out to him told him that his angry friend had given chase.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it’s a bit of a weak ending to this chapter, but I really don’t know where else to end it. I also thought it would be funny if it ended with Stan chasing Kyle out of the room. So, why is he chasing him? Why did Wendy decide to kiss Kyle? Why hasn’t Cartman confessed how he feels about Kyle yet? Because I’m a sick fuck, that’s why!  
> Anyways, make sure to leave a review, stay lovely, and remember: if at first you do succeed, try not to look so surprised.


	23. Searching for the Feelings I Can't Control

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What my archive of our own readers don’t realize is that I am actually typing this story in a mad scientist’s lab, cackling evilly as I type my story while lightning flashes behind me. Because I am a sadist who likes to torture my favorite characters, and laugh at me readers’ pain! Wait… did I say that out loud?  
> But in all seriousness, I love you guys and your comments make me smile. When I need something to cheer me up, I just go and reread my lovelies’ comments. You guys are the best!
> 
> “Say, won’t you say forever, stay, if we stay forever, hey, we can stay forever young!”

Kyle could feel his heart pounding in his chest as he sprinted down the hall. He could hear Stan close behind him, trying to call out to him while running at the same time. He made a sharp turn, rushing down a different hallway, then turned down another hallway. He saw an empty classroom nearby and quickly ran over to it, closing the door in a hurry. Chest heaving, he pressed himself against the door and listened carefully. After a long moment, he heard the sound of rushed footsteps pass by and slowly fade.  
Breathing a sigh of relief, he waited for his breathing to become under control before turning back towards the room. Kyle looked around at the empty classroom and decided to take one of the empty seats. He sat down and immediately buried his face into his arms, wishing that his parents hadn’t talked him into coming to this stupid dance. He had finally started getting Stan to trust him again, and then Wendy had to go and kiss him. In front of everyone. Why did his life suck so much?  
A noise from behind him made him slowly turn, already knowing who would be standing there. Sure enough, when he turned around Angela was already closing the door behind her, smiling seductively. He quickly stood and took a cautious step back, narrowing his eyes at her.  
“What are you doing here?” he hissed, trying to keep the fear from his voice. She smiled at him, somehow managing to show all of her teeth.  
“I just wanted to talk to you,” she replied innocently. “I know you’ve been avoiding me.”  
“And why do you think that is?” he growled, taking another step back.  
“Oh, come on, Kyle,” she said in an annoyingly sing-song voice. “You can’t deny our love forever, you know. Stan’s not here right now so you don’t have to pretend with me.”  
“Who says I’m pretending?” Kyle responded. She quickly started closing the gap between them and Kyle took another nervous step away from her. Angela took the opportunity get closer. “Stay away from me,” he warned her. She didn’t listen and instead quickened her pace. Flinching, he took another step back and felt something jab him in the back. With a start, he knew that he had backed himself against the blackboard.  
Angela had caught up to him, and before he could stop her she began kissing him deeply. He tried to shove her away, but she quickly wrapped her arms around him, pinning him to her as she pressed against him. She pushed him hard against the blackboard, and he gasped as the sharp edge stabbed at him. Smiling to herself, Angela used the opportunity to slip her tongue into his mouth, kissing him deeper.  
His breath caught in his chest as she explored his mouth, and he tried in vain to push her away again. He was caught off guard when she suddenly decided to push back, slamming him into a corner and pressing harder against him. She continued to kiss him deeper, her tongue slithering down his throat and making him want to gag.  
Finally, she stopped kissing him, keeping her forehead pressed to his and her lips hovering above his. She couldn’t help but smile as he glared at her, breathing heavily. Then she quite suddenly began kissing his neck and he let out a gasp. He could feel her grin as she moved her lips over his neck, forcing him to shudder every time he felt her lips against him. She kissed her way over to under his jaw, pressing her lips harder against him.  
“I hate you,” he eventually managed to growl at her. She stopped and looked at him.  
“God, I love you,” she said, kissing him on the mouth again. “You know, the best part is that you’ll never be able to beat me. We’ll have this forbidden love forever, you know.”  
“Guess again, bitch,” Kyle hissed at her. “I’m going to stop you somehow.”  
She laughed coldly and kissed him again, covering his mouth with hers. He gritted his teeth against her, determined not to let her get the better of him. She pressed herself closer to him and in a last act of desperation, he brought his foot slamming down on hers. She let out a yelp and broke away, giving him enough to slip past her and create room between them.  
“You will be mine, Kyle,” Angela threatened, turning to glare at him.  
“You will never control me,” Kyle retorted coldly before turning on his heel and heading towards the door, keeping his back to her the entire time. He ignored her as she angrily tried to call him back, and he didn’t stop walking until he had gotten at least two hallways away from that classroom.  
Then he stopped and looked around. Where was he? He had been so angry that he really hadn’t been paying attention to where he was going, and with the hallways so dark at the moment, he had a hard time figuring out what part of the school he was in. He could hear voices and music in the distance and realized he wasn’t that far from the gym.  
Before he could move, however, someone grabbed him from behind, covering his mouth and dragging him backwards down another corridor. He immediately started struggling to escape his attacker’s grasp, but whoever had him wrapped an arm around him, pinning his own arms to his side. Then he was suddenly slammed against the lockers, and he was surprised to see Stan glaring back at him, breathing heavily.  
“Stop struggling,” Stan hissed, keeping his mouth covered. “I just need to talk to you.” Kyle stopped moving and stared him with wide eyes. Now that Stan was inches from his own face, Kyle could see that he looked rather sleep deprived and conflicted with himself. “I saw Wendy kissing you,” Stan said after a moment. “I know it wasn’t your fault.” Kyle stared at him in surprise. Stan wasn’t trying to kill him? Stan looked away for a moment, his eyes clouding with sadness. “Just tell me this. Did it mean anything?”  
Kyle let out a breath before replying. “We’re not dating, if that’s what you’re implying,” he told him. “She still likes you, dude. She would never fuck that up intentionally.”  
“Then why did she kiss you?” Stan wondered, his eyes beginning to water. At this point, Kyle couldn’t tell if he was asking about Wendy or Angela, with the way Stan had started to doubt himself. Either way, Kyle’s answer would be the same. He tried to steel himself against his heartache.  
“I don’t know,” he answered eventually. “You’re going to have to ask her that and find out for yourself.”  
Stan looked at him sadly for a moment, opening and closing his mouth like he wanted to say something more to him, but just couldn’t bring himself to do it. Finally, he let out a long sigh and released him before turning and slowly shuffling back towards the dance. Kyle let out his own sigh before following him.  
Neither of them could immediately see Wendy when they returned to the gymnasium. Kenny was right back next to the refreshment table, with a new plate and drink, looking incredibly bored. Kyle couldn’t help but roll his eyes when he saw him. Of course, Kenny would go right back to the same spot when he was done dancing with Wendy.  
“Hey dude,” Kenny casually greeted when Kyle came over to him. “We saw Stan chase you out of the gym. I’m surprised you’re still alive.”  
“Well, we talked it out,” Kyle muttered. “Where is Wendy, anyway? I don’t see her anywhere.” Kenny looked away awkwardly.  
“She kind of ran off,” he said. “She felt bad about the…you know… and then when you guys ran out of the gym, she said she felt really guilty and ran off.” He paused before adding, “I think she was crying.”  
Kyle’s eyes widened with surprise. “Where did she go?” he asked.

Wendy stood in the girl’s bathroom, staring into the mirror and sobbing silently. She had really blown it. She had just given another reason for Stan to be angry at his best friend, and now he probably thought she and Kyle were dating or something. Why couldn’t she just control herself? Stan would probably never speak to either of them again.  
And she didn’t even want to think about what Kyle thought of her. She had promised that she wouldn’t use him to try and make Stan jealous, but hadn’t she done exactly that? Hadn’t she insisted on hanging out with him as much as possible? I mean, by god, she had dragged him onto the Tunnel of Love with her! What had she been thinking?  
And that kiss. It had taken her breath away. But she hadn’t been thinking of Stan when she had kissed Kyle. As much as she wanted to believe that she had been doing all of this to try and make Stan jealous, she hadn’t been thinking of that whenever she had hung out with his three friends. No, as much as she hated to admit it, but by hanging out with him so much and seeing his compassionate side so often, she had found herself growing a crush on Kyle. It wasn’t the burning love she felt for Stan, but it was enough that she felt dirty for even thinking of it. Why did she have to go and kiss her ex-boyfriend’s best friend?  
She was interrupted out of her thoughts as Kenny, Kyle and Cartman barged into the bathroom and immediately went over to her with a collected “Aw!”  
“No, guys!” she said as the three of them caught her in a group hug. “Seriously, I’m fine!” They refused to release her. “Guys, seriously, this is so weird! You’re not supposed to be in here!”  
“Too bad,” Kenny said, his voice muffled as he was crushed against her.  
It didn’t help that two seconds later, Bebe, Nichole and Heidi also came into the bathroom and immediately added to the group hug. It took about five minutes of convincing before Wendy finally managed to get her friends to release her. They all returned to the dance, and Wendy couldn’t decide if she was annoyed or not when all her friends stuck close to her.  
They would have probably been like that all night if a teacher hadn’t announced at that moment that they were going to do some karaoke. Nichole let out a squeal of joy and before the teacher could even finish asking for volunteers to sing, she was already up on stage, shoving the teacher out of the way and barking at the DJ which song she wanted.  
The entire gymnasium couldn’t help but stare in astonishment as Nichole belted out a soulful rendition of Katy Perry’s Firework, getting so into it that at one point she even kicked the mike stand over. Token buried his face in his hands in embarrassment, while Wendy and Bebe exchanged confused glances. Kenny blinked a couple of times before turning to Kyle.  
“Didn’t you used to have a crush on her?” he asked. The only response he got from his friend was a hard glare.  
When Nichole finished the song (somehow ending up on the floor of the stage), she lay there for a moment before her eyes snapped open and she looked around as if she just realized where she was.  
“What happened?” she asked, causing Token to face palm once more.  
Then Tweek nervously made his way up on stage, then proceeded to sing through all of True Colors in thirty seconds flat, finishing miles ahead of the recording. Craig looked so proud as his boyfriend quickly rushed off the stage. Then Bebe decided to go for a Disney song and sang I Won’t Say I’m in Love from Hercules.  
As their classmates continued to sing painfully appropriate music, Cartman felt like he couldn’t take it anymore and went to find Kyle. He found the Jew standing with Kenny near the snack table, both of them staring out at the dance floor looking incredibly bored. He took a deep breath and approached them.  
“Hey Kyle,” Cartman greeted. “Could I talk to you for a moment?”  
“Sure,” Kyle replied with a shrug, without moving. Cartman rolled his eyes with annoyance.  
“I meant alone,” he clarified. Kyle and Kenny exchanged surprised glances before glancing back at him. He really wished they would stop doing that.  
“Um, yeah, I guess,” Kyle muttered eventually, all of his confidence swept out of him. He muttered a quick “See you later” to Kenny and slowly followed Cartman across the gymnasium. They made their way down the hall, where all of the noise died down the further they got from the gymnasium.  
Finally, Cartman saw a closet far enough away from the gym, and opened the door before turning to Kyle. His friend was standing with his arms folded and staring blankly at him.  
“You want me to go in a closet?” he asked eventually, in a blank tone of voice like he really didn’t believe this was actually happening. Cartman’s only reply was to nod his head. After a long moment of just staring each other down, Cartman let out a sigh and turned out all of his pockets, showing that he had absolutely no weapons on himself. Only then did Kyle move. “Fine,” he muttered. “This had better be really fucking important.”   
The closet was surprisingly big on the inside, and there were a bunch of shelves everywhere, along with a couple of buckets. After turning on the lights, Kyle turned over one of the buckets and sat down on it, staring expectantly at Cartman. Finding himself finally alone with him, face to face, Cartman suddenly began feeling incredibly nervous, and the words suddenly died in his throat.  
Well, he had to say something! He couldn’t just continue to stand there silently while Kyle grew more and more impatient, which was already starting to happen.  
“So,” Cartman said nervously. “How have you been?”  
Kyle let out a long sigh while rolling his eyes. “Well, this girl that’s dating my best friend has a crush on me, my best friend hates me because of it, and his ex-girlfriend kissed me to try and make him jealous,” he growled. “How do you think I’m doing?” Before Cartman could answer, he continued. “Cartman, just tell me what you wanted to talk to me about already.”  
Cartman closed his eyes for a moment before taking a long, deep breath. “Well, as you’ve probably noticed by now, I haven’t been acting…myself lately,” he started. He could have sworn that Kyle muttered “Yeah, no fucking shit,” under his breath at that moment, but he ignored it. “Well, here’s the thing… I think, no, I know… I’m in love with you.”  
There was a long moment of shocked silence, and Cartman couldn’t bear to look at him. Then, suddenly and with no warning, Kyle burst out laughing. Cartman turned around to stare at him as the other doubled over in laughter, clutching his sides. He had expected this. He would patiently wait for him to stop.  
Kyle felt like he had never laughed so hard in his entire life. He had to grab one of the shelves to keep himself from falling over he was laughing so hard. He continued laughing for what seemed a good ten minutes, but as he finally began regaining his breath, he saw the completely serious, deadpan look in Cartman’s eyes and all of his laughter immediately left him.  
“Oh my God, you were serious,” he suddenly realized, his eyes widening. Cartman continued to stare passively at him. “Look, Cartman,” he started. “You’re not really in love with me. You just think you are because of what that psychiatrist told you.”  
“How do you know what she told me?” Cartman asked, with a hint of a growl in his voice.  
“Kenny and I snuck into her office last week,” Kyle explained. “Everyone in school was acting weird, and Kenny and I noticed that we were the only two who hadn’t been to see her, so we broke in after school. She recorded her first session with you, but I didn’t think you would actually believe her.” He had looked down when he admitted this, but when he looked up, Cartman was in front of him, pinning his shoulders against the opposite wall.  
“Does this seem imagined to you?” he growled at him, and then before Kyle could reply, he kissed him deeply.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And yes, I am going to end this chapter right here! Ha ha! I am so evil! Yes, you have to wait until next chapter before you find out how this is going to play out! That’s going to be fun!  
> Anyway, I don’t know why I made Nichole kind of crazy. I just thought it would be funny. I haven’t really seen any episodes with her in it, so I don’t know what she’s actually like. And hopefully next time I’ll remember to mention that Dr. Pidd has been here the whole time, because she’s kind of important to the climax.  
> Don’t forget to leave a review and remember, licking doorknobs is illegal on other planets.


	24. Passing the Point of No Return

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to say, we’re coming near the end of our journey. Only three more chapters left. How am I going to resolve all this conflict in just three chapters? By typing it of course! (Crickets start chirping) Thank you! I’ll be here all week!
> 
> “Singing Radiohead at the top of our lungs, with the boom box blaring as we’re falling in love! Got a bottle of whatever, but it’s getting us drunk singing Here’s to never growing up!”

Kyle’s eyes widened with surprise as he felt Cartman’s lips press against his, and he felt all of the air being sucked from his body. He tried in vain to push him away, but Cartman was much stronger than him, and he still had his shoulders pinned.  
He wished he hadn’t been about to ask what Cartman was doing, because the larger boy had forced his mouth open and his tongue inside in a matter of seconds. In the very small part of his mind that wasn’t panicking and freaking the fuck out, he wondered why all three people who had kissed him this evening had felt the need to stick their tongues down his throat. And why, out of all of them, Cartman was the gentlest to him.  
Cartman pressed closer to him, and he tried to breathe, but it was impossible. His grip on him tightened, and it felt like every second Cartman continued to kiss him, there was a dagger slowly piercing his heart. He felt everything around him begin to unravel, and he couldn’t do anything except wish for it to stop.  
Cartman felt Kyle shudder against him, but there was no way he was going to stop kissing him yet. He didn’t care that he was probably terrified of him now. He didn’t care how rough he became. He needed to show Kyle exactly what he thought of him. Convince him that he came to this on his own, without the help of Dr. Pidd. And because he was pretty sure that after this moment, Kyle was never going to speak to him again for as long as they both lived.  
But God damn, he loved how he tasted. He had kissed plenty of girls before (really! He had!), but kissing Kyle was something entirely different. He felt his blood rush through him as he kissed him deeper. There didn’t seem to be a single, solitary sound except for Kyle’s rushing heart beat in his ears. His hands slid down to his arms, pinning them to his sides, and he felt Kyle’s breaths become shallower. Was kissing the person he thought he had hated for years supposed to feel this right?  
Finally, he couldn’t take it anymore and he wrapped his arms around the smaller boy, pulling him in as close as he could, his mouth never leaving his. What little air that was left was pressed right out of Kyle’s body as he continued to kiss him deeper.  
Neither of them knew how long they were there for, but finally, just as Kyle felt like he was going to pass out, Cartman pulled away from him, staying close to him and relaxing his grip. Kyle took ragged breaths, and both stared at each other in shock, as if they couldn’t believe what had just happened.  
“I think I almost would have preferred it if you had killed me,” Kyle eventually murmured before slowly sliding to the floor. With a sigh, Cartman slowly sat down next to him, making sure not to touch him. Neither of them spoke for a long time, instead just staring straight and not looking at each other, letting the moment wash over them. They sat there in complete silence not only because of what had just happened, but because the author really had no idea how you come back from that and where to go from there, and she was really just making any excuse to stall enough to come up with something.  
Cartman, once he decided that the author had stalled long enough, let out a sigh and glanced over at Kyle, who was still staring out in front of him with a slightly haunted look on his face. Well, that didn’t bode well. Should he try to say something to him? On the bright side, Kyle hadn’t made any attempt to leave yet, though it was probably just because he was still trying to process what had just happened.  
“Kyle?” Cartman asked hesitantly. “Are you ok?”  
His friend didn’t reply for a long moment, and Cartman started to believe that he hadn’t heard him until he suddenly let out a long sigh.  
“I don’t know,” he mumbled, still not looking at him. “I don’t know what to think anymore.” Cartman blinked nervously at him as he buried his face in his hands. “I don’t know what to do about any of this.”  
Feeling a bit braver, Cartman pressed against his side comfortingly. “We’ll figure something out,” he promised. Kyle didn’t reply, pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his head on them with a slight groan. “I’m sorry,” Cartman couldn’t help but apologize.  
“Well, this did explain a lot,” Kyle replied in a deadpan tone. “Is this why you were so adamant about going on the Ferris Wheel with me?”  
Cartman had to take a moment to remember what he was talking about because that carnival seemed so long ago now. He felt himself blush as he looked away.  
“Maybe,” he replied eventually.  
“I knew I shouldn’t have let my parents talked me into coming here,” Kyle muttered under his breath. “I just can’t catch a fucking break this week.”  
Cartman was still kind of surprised from the fact that Kyle hadn’t even sort of blown up at him yet. He had expected at least a “don’t ever touch me again” from him, but all the energy seemed to have been drained from him. And though he was glad to know that Kyle didn’t seem to hate him, he could tell from the red head’s tone of voice and body language that he obviously didn’t share his feelings.  
From the look on his face, Cartman could tell that Kyle was thinking over the past several weeks, adding in this new revelation and fitting them together. After a moment, Kyle’s eyes widened with surprise and he finally looked over at Cartman.  
“Oh my God, you were trying to ask me out for that double date with Stan, weren’t you?” he asked him. Cartman’s own eyes widened with surprise and he refused to answer. God, that seemed an even longer time ago.  
Kyle sighed and he nudged Cartman gently with his elbow. “You’re an idiot,” he said with what sounded a bit like affection. Cartman blinked back at him, not quite sure how to respond to that.  
Kyle looked totally exhausted from everything that had been happening, and Cartman hated piling onto his worries like this, but he couldn’t help it. He had needed to get this all off his chest. And now that it was all out in the open, a weight had been lifted off of him, and now there was only one thing left for him to do. He was going to destroy Angela.  
He tried not to act startled when Kyle suddenly stood and turned to him, holding out a hand to help him to his feet. “Thanks for telling me this, Cartman,” he said in a gentle voice. “I’m glad to know that you’re on my side.”  
Cartman gratefully took his hand and stood as well. Facing him, Cartman couldn’t help but lean forward and kiss him gently. He felt Kyle stiffen with shock as he kissed him, and he quickly pulled away from him before Kyle could panic or push him away.  
“Let’s just get back to that stupid dance,” Kyle sighed after a moment.  
The two of them slowly made their way back towards the gym together, not speaking. Cartman was grateful that Kyle let him press against his side as they walked, though he could tell that he felt uncomfortable about the whole thing.  
As soon as they returned to the dance, Cartman spotted Stan on the other side of the gym, actually by himself for once. His resolve hardened and he immediately left Kyle’s side to go speak to him. Kyle looked around the gym and with a bit of annoyance noticed that Kenny was at the exact same spot next to the refreshment table. He wasn’t sure, but he was fairly certain that he was still sipping the same glass of punch too.  
“Where have you been?” Kenny wondered when Kyle came over to him.  
“The bathroom,” Kyle answered immediately. Kenny blinked in disbelief at him.  
“You were in the bathroom for twenty minutes?” he asked. His friend stared at him.  
“That seriously took twenty minutes?!?” he asked. Kenny glanced at his watch.  
“Actually, it was more like twenty-five minutes,” he corrected. Kyle let out a groan and slid to the floor in response. Kenny looked down at him. “So, what did Cartman want to talk to you about?” he wondered. Kyle stood and gave him a strange glare.  
“Stuff,” he snapped at him. Kenny blinked in surprise at his answer.  
“What kind of stuff?” he asked.  
“Have you moved from that spot at all?” Kyle asked, changing the subject. Kenny couldn’t help but glare at him.  
“Of course, I have,” he growled.  
“I mean besides when Wendy dragged you onto the dance floor with her,” Kyle sighed, rolling his eyes.  
“Oh!” Kenny replied before adding with a mumble, “N-no…”  
Kyle let out another sigh and leaned against the wall. Kenny copied him, chugging down his drink as he did. Kyle ignored him and tried to gather his thoughts. He almost didn’t notice Dr. Pidd dressed in a weird outfit, walking around and poking people in the back with a fake arrow with a heart on the end. To be fair, he hadn’t really met or talked to her and really only had Cartman’s description of her to go on, but he did eventually realize that yup, that was definitely her.  
He nudged Kenny to get his attention, then pointed in her direction. Kenny glanced at her, then did a double take as his eyes widened with surprised.  
“What is she doing here?” he wondered. “Why is she poking people with what I really hope is a fake arrow? And why is she dressed as a sexy angel?”  
“And why did Cartman fail to mention just how terrifying her smile is?” Kyle added, his eye twitching slightly in fear. “It looks like she wants to eat my soul.”  
He couldn’t help but hate that doctor. Not only did she put the notion of Cartman being in love with him into Cartman’s head, but if Kenny was right, then she also encouraged Angela with her nasty plan. He didn’t know what her plan was, or why, but she was helping basically ruin his life. Then there was the fact that she was messing up all their friends and suggested to Stan that he was right in hating his own best friend.  
Speaking of which, where was Stan and Cartman? Kyle tore his eyes away from the creepy doctor, glancing around the room, and spotting the two on the other side of the gym. He couldn’t tell what they were saying, but Stan had a worried look on his face for some reason.  
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Devil’s in the Details had returned to the stage, though they hadn’t started playing anything yet. Reeah was looking at Dr. Pidd in mild confusion for some strange reason, as if she recognized her or something.  
Suddenly an idea formed in his head. “I’ll be right back,” Kyle said to Kenny, then hurried away before his friend could reply. When he returned about three minutes later, Cartman had finished talking to Stan was standing with Kenny, looking a bit proud of himself. When Kyle returned to his two friends, also with a smug grin, Cartman immediately pressed lightly against his side. Kyle tried not to shudder as he turned and gave him a confused look.  
“What are you so smug about?” he asked. Cartman hesitated.  
“Nothing,” he replied. “What are you so smug about?” Kyle gave him a wicked grin.  
“You’ll see,” was all he would say.  
Reeah and her band were standing around on the stage, tuning their instruments and looking slightly bored. Then, a couple minutes later, a teacher walked up to them with the suggestion box, which Reeah took from him. She pulled out a slip of paper and carefully read it. A satisfied smirk appeared on her lips and the three friends could have sworn that she glanced in their direction.  
They were close enough to hear her say, “Heh. Nice,” before turning to her band mates and showing them the paper. They all grinned and took up their instruments as Reeah stepped over to the microphone, pulling it out of the stand. Everyone in the gym grew quiet as they turned to look at her.  
“Ok, so we’ve got another request going out,” Reeah announced, the grin never leaving her face. “This one goes out to ‘You know exactly who you are,’ from ‘The Guy Who Hates Your Guts,’ who like to lovingly tell you to ‘Suck it, Bitch!’” Kenny let out a victorious “Ha!” as they noticed Angela easily put two and two together and let out a cry of outrage. “So, from the guy who hates your guts who would like you to suck it, bitch; here’s the perfect song for you!”  
Cartman and Kenny burst out laughing as Reeah nodded to her band and they started playing Katy Perry’s Roar. From where they stood, the three of them could see Angela glare up at the stage in unmasked anger.  
“I used to bite my tongue and hold my breath,” Reeah sang, winking in the friends’ direction. “Scared to rock the boat and make a mess!”  
Wendy, from where she was standing with Bebe and Nichole, pumped her fists into the air, yelling “Woo!” as the song went on.  
“You held me down, but I got up, already brushing off the dust!  
You hear my voice, you hear that sound!  
Like thunder, gonna shake the ground!  
You held me down, but I got up!  
Get ready, cuz I’ve had enough!”  
It was probably just a coincidence (but it totally wasn’t), but every time Reeah got to the “you” in the song, she seemed to point in Angela’s direction. Angela narrowed her eyes, then glanced over at where the three boys were high-fiving each other.  
“I’ve got the eye of the tiger, a fighter  
Dancing through the fire  
Cuz I am a champion!  
And you’re gonna hear me roar!  
Louder, louder than a lion  
Cuz I am a champion!  
And you’re gonna hear me roar!”  
As Kyle turned to look back up at the stage, he noticed Angela standing in the middle of the room, staring at him. He gave the evilest grin he could muster before casually throwing her the middle finger. The look of pure outrage on Angela’s face at his gesture was priceless.  
Everyone except for Angela burst into applause when song was finished. Then Reeah held the microphone out in front of her and dropped it onto the stage before any teacher could stop her. Stan watched the band with an amused grin on his face, then turned to go find Angela.  
Meanwhile, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny were still laughing over what had just happened.  
“That was amazing, Kyle,” Kenny said through laughs. Kyle gave him an innocent look.  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, though his grin said otherwise. “It’s not my fault that bitch knew that song was for her. She can’t prove it.”  
“Did you see the look on her face?” Cartman asked excitedly, holding on to Kenny’s shoulder to keep himself from falling over in laughter.  
“Ok, well, I’m going to go find Ike to see if he’s ready to leave yet,” Kyle told his friends. “And make sure he’s actually still in the building.”  
“You are the worst big brother ever,” Kenny said, rolling his eyes. Kyle glared at him.  
“Oh yeah? And where’s Karen?” he shot back. Since Kenny couldn’t answer that, he just grumbled under his breath instead.  
“I’ll go with you,” Cartman offered. Kyle opened his mouth to rebuff him, but then remembered what had happened at the beginning of the chapter and stayed silent instead.  
Kenny stood and watched the two of them disappear in the crowd, but he wasn’t standing there for long when he was surprised to see Stan making his way towards him. Stan had a strange look on his face as he approached him.  
“Have you seen Kyle?” Stan asked when he reached him. Kenny couldn’t help but feel nervous at that question.  
“He went to find Ike,” Kenny answered after a moment. “Why? What do you want with him?” Stan rolled his eyes at the suspicion.  
“I just want to tell him something,” he told him.  
“Tell him what?” Kenny asked, cocking an eyebrow.  
“I just broke up with Angela,” Stan replied after a moment of hesitation. Whatever Kenny was expecting to hear, it definitely hadn’t been that. All he could do was gape in astonishment at Stan for a long moment.  
“Really?” was all he could say when he finally found his voice. Stan nodded. “Why?”  
“Because I realized you guys were right,” Stan said with a sigh. “I was just blind to the truth because I didn’t want to accept the fact that she didn’t like me the way I liked her. Besides, don’t tell anyone else this, but Cartman talked some sense into me.”  
Kenny blinked in surprise. “How did he do that?” he wondered.  
Stan looked away. “He told me he saw what happened…that day,” he muttered. “He recited everything they said and did, so I didn’t think he was lying. And besides, he’s been on Kyle’s side this entire time. That’s got to count for something.”  
Kenny gave him a sympathetic smile and put a comforting hand on his shoulder.  
“I’m sorry, dude,” he said earnestly. “I know you really liked her.” Stan gave him a sad smile back. “So, how did she handle you dumping her?”  
“I think she took it pretty well,” Stan replied. His words were drowned out, however, when a chair went soaring past them, missing Stan’s head by mere inches, and hitting the wall behind them so hard that the chair literally disintegrated. Staring in horror at where the chair had hit the wall for a moment, the two of them slowly turned to see Angela standing there menacingly, a look of unbridled rage on her face.  
“You are dead!” she hissed at Stan, slowly picking up another chair. “Nobody dumps me! NOBODY!” And she threw the chair with all her might.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yup. Another cliffhanger. Turns out, Angela doesn’t cope well with people telling her she’s a bitch and then dumping her. Go figure. And now she wants to murder Stan, even though she had been cheating on him from the very beginning and was planning on dumping him soon because of her own stupid plan. But hey, as she said, nobody dumps Angela.  
> As a side note, I went to spell the word suspicion and was surprised when spell checker said I actually spelled it right. Have you ever had a time when you think you’ve obviously spelled a word wrong because it looks so stupid and you never had to spell it before and don’t know how to spell, then are surprised when you learn that you actually spelled it right? Happens to me all the time.


	25. You're Gonna Hear Me Roar!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I’ll give you full disclosure. I’ve never had three people kiss me in one night, or professed their love to me even though I thought they hated me, so I have no idea if the last chapter was accurate or not.  
> Anyway, second to last chapter! Yay! Has anyone guessed what’s really up with Dr. Pidd yet? I don’t know, I’m typing this right after I finished the last chapter. I hid three clues in my story of who she is, and this chapter we’re finally going to find out what the hell is up with her terrible advice and why she’s so creepy! Oh, and I guess some other stuff not involving Dr. Pidd is also going to happen.
> 
> “We’ll be running down the street, yelling ‘Kiss my ass!’ I’m like yeah, whatever, we’re still living like that!”

Stan just barely managed to duck in time to dodge the second chair that was thrown at him, which disintegrated as well. Kenny couldn’t help but stare in horror as Angela angrily started towards them in a menacing manner. He looked down at Stan, who was struggling to his feet, before looking back at Angela, who was picking up another chair.  
“Stan,” Kenny said slowly, staring with wide eyes. “Run!”  
Angela let out a primal scream, and Kenny quickly grabbed Stan’s arm, dragging him to his feet. They both let out a scream of fright when the third chair soared past their heads before the two of them broke into a run. Angela gave chase to them, picking up and throwing everything she could reach at them.  
Students looked around, confused, as Kenny and Stan weaved around them, trying to get away from the angry ball of fire that was Angela. They made it to the double doors leading out of the gym and rushed out into the hallways, with Angela hot on their heels.  
“What the fuck is she so angry about?” Kenny gasped as they ran down the hall. “I thought she was hoping this would happen!”  
“Just keep running!” Stan panted.  
“You two are going to pay!” they could hear Angela screaming after them. Kenny almost stumbled over his own feet at her words.  
“What did I do?” he wondered, quickly catching back up with Stan. His friend couldn’t help but roll his eyes. He was about to reply, but something else sped past their heads and cut off his words. They only barely just managed to not trip over the scattered remains of whatever Angela had thrown at them.  
Stan looked over his shoulder and saw that he and Kenny were managing to gain some distance from the crazy bitch, and for a moment, he thought that they would actually manage to lose her. Despite her anger, she was running in high heels, and that made running much harder, even when fueled by a burning rage.  
But then, while still chasing after them, she reached down and in one swift motion, managed to pull off one of her shoes and throw it, hitting Stan squarely in the back. He let out a cry of pain and fell to the ground. Kenny skidded to a halt and turned back towards his friend, looking terrified. He quickly lunged forward and tried to pull Stan to his feet, but Angela was already closing the gap and was dangerously close to them.  
For a moment, Kenny thought that they were doomed, but then he saw a flash of movement, and then Kyle was there, tackling Angela out of the way before she could attack them. He slammed her into the lockers, taking her by surprise, but she was quick to recover. As Kyle tried to keep her pinned against the lockers, she jabbed him hard in the ribs with her elbow, and she tackled him to the ground when he released his grip on her.  
Angela landed on top of him, but Kyle managed to work his foot under her stomach and kick her away from him. She slowly stood and turned towards Kenny and Stan, anger burning in her eyes, and she started towards them again before being tackled from behind by Kyle once more. She let out a scream of rage as the two of them struggled with each other.  
Kenny and Stan both blinked in surprise at the sight, completely unable to move and help their friend, as if forgetting how their legs worked. Somehow, Angela managed to end up on top of Kyle during their struggle, forcing him on his back and pinning his arms to the ground. They were both breathing heavily as Kyle snarled angrily at her, while Angela had her face mere inches from his.  
“Kyle!” Kenny cried in fear. But before he could even move to help him, Angela was suddenly thrown off of his friend by Cartman, who managed to easily pin her down and sit on top of her, a triumphant look on his face. She screamed and spat in rage, struggling to free herself, but Cartman didn’t even sort of move.  
Kyle, still breathing heavily, slowly sat up and glared slightly at Cartman.  
“What took you so long?” he wondered. Cartman gave him an annoyed glance.  
“You try running when you’re out of shape,” he growled. “It’s not easy, I’ll tell you that.” He turned to look at Stan and Kenny, who were both still watching in amazement. “Are you guys ok?” he asked them.  
“Yeah, we’re fine,” Stan managed to gasp. “Just a bit out of breath.”  
“Where did you guys come from?” Kenny asked. “And how did you know she was chasing us anyway?”  
“You ran right past us,” Kyle explained. “And this one was spitting so much fire, it wasn’t that hard to follow you guys.” He went over and kicked Angela in the side just for good measure. “It’s a good thing too. She looked ready to tear you apart.”  
“What did you guys do to make her so pissed?” Cartman asked, ignoring Angela’s angry insults that were being thrown at him as she struggled to escape. “I need to know so I can do it too.”  
“I broke up with her,” Stan announced, to Kyle and Cartman’s utter amazement. The two of them exchanged glances, looked down at the still furious Angela, then up at Stan.  
“Really?” Cartman wondered. Stan nodded in reply. “Dude, it’s about time!”  
“Get off of me, you fucking fat tub of lard!” Angela hissed up at Cartman. Kyle rolled his eyes and casually kicked her in the side again.  
“Shut up, you bitch,” he growled at her. “This is all your fault in the first place.” He narrowed his eyes slightly, glancing at Stan and adding, “Well, mostly your fault.”  
Stan felt his heart shatter at his words, but before he could say anything, Kenny suddenly spoke up.  
“So, what do we do now?” he asked. “I mean, I don’t think Cartman wants to sit on that piece of shit forever, but if we let her go, she’s just going to kill us.” Angela spat at him in response to his words.  
Stan was about to suggest one of them getting a teacher, but he was interrupted by the sound of high heels clicking down the hallway, and then Dr. Pidd appeared a moment later. She still had the creepy, condescending smile on her face as she took in the scene, and she let out a sigh like she had to let her dog out right after she had just gotten comfortable.  
“I was afraid this would happen,” she sighed, shaking her head. “I’m sorry it had to come to this, but if you had all just followed my advice, this all wouldn’t be happening right now, you know.”  
The four friends exchanged confused glances as Dr. Pidd pulled out a briefcase from seemingly nowhere and calmly unlocked and opened it. Angela continued to squirm underneath Cartman, and she let out a gasp when she saw the crazy therapist.  
“Dr. Pidd, help!” she cried. “They’re ruining everything!”  
“Oh, don’t worry, dear,” Pidd replied calmly, rummaging for something in the briefcase. “I’ll fix this. Everything can still go according to plan, I just have to make a few adjustments. But I’m always so disorganized, I can’t find anything! I’m so scatter-brained sometimes.” She giggled in the creepiest way as she continued looking through her case.  
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Kenny asked cautiously.  
“What’s going on here?” Stan added, scratching his head in confusion. Dr. Pidd looked up and smiled her terrifying smile at them, causing the four of them to flinch.  
“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m being terribly rude,” she said in a voice that sounded like she was trying to make a baby laugh. “You see, being a therapist is only a cover for my real job.” None of the boys looked surprised by that news. “In actuality, I’m Cupid. Or rather, a cupid. It’s my job to go from place to place every Valentine’s and spread love wherever I go.”  
The four of them exchanged surprised glances with each other before turning back to the woman. “You’re joking, right?” Cartman wondered.  
“Oh sure, I can see why you would be sceptic,” Pidd replied, going back to her briefcase. “We don’t go around shooting too many arrows at people anymore. There was a lawsuit about that, so we had to stop. Fortunately, we have… other means of influencing people’s emotions. I started out using more indirect methods of suggestion to bring more love to this school. But, unfortunately, it looks like I’m going to have to use more direct methods now.”  
Then she let out an “aha!” and set her briefcase on the ground. She seemed to be working on something which required both hands, and when she stood, they were terrified to see that she was holding a big-ass needle that was filled with a strange, pink liquid. She took a step forward and, before any of them could move, she lashed out a hand and seized Kyle by the throat, easily lifting him off of his feet.  
“Kyle!” his three friends cried out at the same time. Kyle felt his breathing immediately cut off as he attempted to struggle out of her grasp, but she didn’t even seem to notice him.  
“Let him go,” Stan growled at her, taking a step forward. “What are you doing?”  
“You see, I love reading romance novels,” Pidd explained calmly, tightening her grip on Kyle’s neck. “They’re kind of my passion. So, when this poor young girl came to me, wanting to live out her own romance story, I jumped at the opportunity. But now you kids had to go and ruin everything. Thankfully, my love serum here should fix everything.”  
“Poor little girl?” Cartman snarled. “She’s a psychotic bitch!”  
“Say what you want,” Angela sneered. “Didn’t I tell I always get what I want?”  
Cartman glared down at her and shifted his weight ever so slightly so that he was choking the air out of her lungs.  
“Don’t make another move,” Pidd said cheerfully to Kenny, who was trying to make his way over to her. “Or your friend is going to get it.” To their horror, Kyle’s struggles were getting weaker as he began to run out of air, and her grip on his neck didn’t seem to be loosening. “Stop struggling, my dear,” Pidd said soothingly. “You’ll just make it more painful and harder on yourself.”  
She held up the needle, but before she could jab it into him, there was a loud, hard crack, and she let go of Kyle before falling face first onto the floor. Standing behind her, holding her guitar over her shoulder and looking rather smug, was Reeah.  
“Did you kids need a rescue?” she asked, a calm, knowing smile on her face.  
“What are you doing here?” Kenny blurted out, his eyes wide.  
“I had to pee, but I had no idea where the bathrooms are,” Reeah explained. “I heard a commotion going on over here, so I thought I’d pitch in. Lucky for you guys, I always have my guitar handy.” She nudged the unconscious Pidd with her foot. “This crazy bitch was in my town a few years ago. I thought I had recognized her.”  
Stan wasn’t listening as he quickly made his way over to Kyle’s side, and he was relieved to see his friend was still breathing. He had fallen unconscious as well, and his breaths came out as gasps, but at least he was still alive.  
Cartman stared over at them with wide eyes, completely unaware of Angela shouting and spitting with rage. He was breathing hard, and his brain didn’t seem to want to work out what had just happened. He looked down at Pidd, still in complete shock.  
Reeah looked around at them, then slung her guitar over her other shoulder. “I’m going to go find you guys a teacher before anything else happens,” she told them. “Just stay here and don’t move.” Then she turned on her heel and made her way back down the hall. They could hear her voice echo off the walls as she called out, “Man, I love this town!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there you go. The second to last chapter is completed. I’m sorry if Reeah coming out of nowhere to save the day seemed like a bit of a deus ex machina, but keep in mind, Stan and Kenny were chased out of the room with a huge crowd mingling about. Someone was bound to notice them and give chase. Plus, I didn’t know how else to have Dr. Pidd reveal herself as Cupid and be defeated.  
> Anyways, in the last chapter we will be wrapping up all loose ends and finally ending this damn thing. And then we get to move on to the sequel! Yay! Anyways, how many of you went back to try and figure out Dr. Pidd’s identity? I had actually planned on that plot twist from the very start, so yay me! It doesn’t change the fact that she’s terrible at her job. Both of her jobs.  
> Leave a review and remember, you will never have abs. Love, Pizza.


	26. Here's to Never Growing Up!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoa, here we go! The last chapter! What a ride it’s been, but we’re finally at the end. I hope I will see all of you lovelies in the sequel, but for now we must say “farewell.” At least I already have the first two chapters of the sequel typed out, so I won’t be leaving my lovelies hanging on for too long.  
> Anyways, what’s going to happen now that everything has been revealed? How am I going to make it so that there’s a sequel? Will I ever stop breaking the fourth wall? Of course, I won’t but that’s not the point.
> 
> “When the sun’s going down, we’ll be raising our cups, singing…”

Almost as if a spell had been lifted, the school seemed to return to normal almost instantaneously. Dr. Pidd and Angela were both led out of the building, and the next day they found out that Angela was suspended from school indefinitely. Everybody was no longer walking the halls like weird, gloomy zombies.  
Before her band packed up left for the night, Reeah made sure to check in with Stan and his friends, handing them a card with her band’s name and a phone number on it.  
“If you guys ever want to come to any of our concerts, just give me a call and I’ll get you free front row seats,” she told them.  
“Seriously? You can do that?” Kenny asked, excitedly. Reeah winked at him.  
“Of course,” she replied. “Just my way of thanks for showing us a good time. This place is hilarious!” Then she picked up her guitar (which still had a hint of blood on it), and followed after her band mates, her hips swaying as she went.  
The dance had already wound down by that point, and none of them could really remember much after that. Because really, who would remember a mundane dance after a psychopath chased you down and threatened to kill you right before a therapist found you and revealed that she was really Cupid all along?  
To be fair, things were still kind of uncomfortable the next Monday following the dance. Stan knew everything wouldn’t just magically go back to normal now that Angela was finally gone. He still had to fix everything, it was just a matter of tracking down Wendy and Kyle. Wendy wasn’t that hard, she wasn’t exactly trying to avoid him, but Kyle ignored his phone calls and avoided him every chance he got.  
But it was really kind of hard to avoid someone in the lunch room (actually, it kind of was, Cartman managed to somehow not show up at all to lunch). When Stan came into the cafeteria, he saw Kyle and Kenny at their usual table, sitting with Craig and his gang. He took a deep breath and made his way over to them.  
“Kyle, I need to talk to you,” Stan said when he reached them. Kyle let out a sigh and turned in his seat to look at him.  
“What?” he asked in a deadpan tone of voice. The others at the table stopped what they were doing and looked up to listen in on this. Stan suppressed a sigh of annoyance. Why did the author always insist on forcing them to clarify that they wanted to speak in private? (Because she was a dick, that’s why.)  
Without saying anything, Stan grabbed Kyle by the arm and quickly dragged him out of the cafeteria, ignoring his protests. He didn’t need all of his friends watching as he stumbled through his apology. When they were far enough from the cafeteria, Stan stopped and turned towards Kyle, who was giving him an annoyed look.  
“What do you want, Stan?” he asked with a hint of a growl. Stan sighed.  
“I wanted to apologize,” he told him. “I should have never believed Angela over you. I guess I just didn’t want to believe that the girl I liked would try and cheat on me with my best friend, and I took it out on you.”  
“That’s not an apology,” Kyle pointed out calmly. “That’s just an acknowledgement that I was right.” Stan sighed and rolled his eyes.  
“I’m sorry,” he added.  
“There you go,” Kyle replied, smiling slightly. “And I accept your apology.” Stan sighed in relief.  
“Can we just go back to being best friends?” he asked him. Kyle’s grin didn’t change as he punched Stan in the shoulder.  
“Of course,” he told him. “So, what made you change your mind about that bitch anyways?”  
“Well, the real reason is I just wanted my friends back,” Stan confessed. “I didn’t want to continue to date a girl if I was going to lose my best friend in the process.” His eyes became haunted for a moment. “It did not end well.”  
“Yeah, I know, I was there,” Kyle replied. “I’m sorry she lied to you like that and that you were a dumb ass bitch for believing her. I know you really liked her, and I’m sorry she had to be attracted to me of all people.”  
“Yeah, well, she wasn’t worth it,” Stan said with a shrug, frowning slightly at the “dumb ass bitch” line. “Can we just make a promise to each other that we will never let another girl ever come between us again?”  
“Of course,” his friend said. “I promise I will never let you have a girl come between us again.” Stan rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t help but smile. He had missed this.  
“You’re such an asshole,” he told him.  
“I like to think so,” Kyle said, the smug grin never leaving his face.

Stan walked down the hallway with a slow step, nervously looking for Wendy. He hated that he had to go begging to her, but seeing her kiss Kyle at the dance made him realize that he was not over Wendy, and he desperately needed her back. But he wasn’t sure if she wanted him back. He couldn’t blame her, he wouldn’t take himself back after the way he acted, but he knew he had to at least try.  
Finally, he turned the corner and saw Wendy putting books into her locker. He froze when he saw her. She was just as beautiful as ever. Why had he never noticed before? He stood there like a rock, but thankfully, she eventually closed her locker and turned in his direction. For some reason, she looked surprised to see him.  
“Oh, hey Stan,” she greeted him, smiling sincerely at him. He managed to make himself smile back and not look too nervous.  
“Hi, Wendy,” he said. “Can I talk to you for a moment?”  
“Sure,” she replied. “What’s up?” Stan took a deep breath.  
“I wanted to start by saying I’m sorry,” he told her. “I’m sorry for acting like such an ass. You were right. I shouldn’t have believed Angela over you and Kyle, but I guess I was still in the honey moon phase, and I didn’t want to see what was painfully obvious.” Wendy continued to smile that blinding smile at him. “Um, and the other thing I wanted to say, er, ask, was…and you can totally say ‘no’ if you want! I wouldn’t blame you, but um…”  
He was saved from further embarrassing himself when Wendy suddenly stepped forward, wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him deeply. She pressed him against the wall, and didn’t seem to care about the fact that everyone around them was staring at them. He was annoyed when he could hear his friends cheering in the background, but again, Wendy didn’t even seem to notice at all.  
She pressed closer to him, and he finally decided to ignore everything else and began kissing her back. He felt as if happiness was just bursting out of his chest, and he wished he could stand there, kissing her forever. She pulled back from kissing him just long enough to whisper something only he could hear.  
“Of course, I’ll go out with you,” she murmured before kissing him again. With a burst of joy, Stan wrapped his arms around her waist and began kissing her back. And everyone around them applauded, cheered, or muttered “Finally.”

Cartman stood in the boy’s bathroom, taking a good long, hard look at himself in the mirror. He never felt more humiliated. He couldn’t believe that fake psychiatrist had been manipulating him all along. And he had actually fallen for it! He didn’t know if he could ever look any of his friends in the face again.  
He was starving from skipping lunch, but he planned to stay in here until the last bell rang and he could go home without being seen by anyone. Too bad it was so boring in here.  
He was cut out of his thoughts by the sound of the door opening. He turned and was dismayed to see Kyle walking in, looking at him as if he wasn’t at all surprised to see him there.  
“What are you doing in here?” Cartman asked, keeping the nervousness out of his voice. Kyle rolled his eyes at him.  
“You do know this is the bathroom, right?” he replied. Cartman blinked at him. “Actually, I was looking for you. I had a feeling that you would hide out in here.”  
Smartass. “What do you want?” he growled. “Did you come to find me just to say you told me so?” Kyle continued to give him a passive stare.  
“Pretty much, yeah,” he replied eventually. Cartman rolled his eyes and turned back to the mirror. Kyle walked over to stand next to him. “You know I’m not mad at you or anything,” he told him gently. “You can’t help what you feel. Even if what you felt was a lie.”  
Cartman scoffed at him. “Oh, that? I’m already over that,” he replied. Kyle cocked an eyebrow at him, obviously not convinced. “Um, you didn’t…tell anyone that I…kissed you, did you?” he asked eventually. Kyle looked at him like he was crazy.  
“Are you kidding?” he said. “Why on earth would I ever tell someone that?” Cartman let out a sigh of relief.  
“Good,” he growled. “That was fucking disgusting. I’d hate for anyone to know about it.”  
“It wasn’t all that bad,” Kyle said with a sly grin on his face. “And if it was so disgusting, why did you kiss me for so long? Or shove your tongue down my throat?” Cartman felt himself start to blush and he angrily turned away so he couldn’t see.  
“Anyway, the real reason why I’m here is to ask you something,” Kyle told him after a moment of silence. Cartman turned back to look at him. “Can we just pretend that none of this ever happened and just go back to being friends who hate each other?”  
Cartman gave him a relieved grin. “Of course, we can,” he said. “And we’ll never talk about this ever again.”  
“Agreed,” Kyle said, patting him on the back. “Glad to have you back to normal, buddy.” Then he turned and left the bathroom, leaving Cartman to stare after him, a look of strange disappointment on his face.

“I have to say, I’m really glad everything’s back to normal,” Kenny said as he and his friends and Wendy walked home together. “At least until tomorrow when something else happens that we have to deal with.”  
Stan and Wendy walked pressed together, holding hands and barely listening to what Kenny was rambling on about. The sun was starting to set, but the air was rather warm despite it being February.  
“I’m just glad this is all over,” Kenny was saying. “You guys were all a bunch of killjoys.” As his three friends turned to glare at him, Wendy let out a sigh.  
“I still can’t believe Dr. Pidd was Cupid all along,” she said. “And she really sucks at her job. Both of them. I can’t believe that bitch actually took her seriously.”  
“Stan took her seriously,” Kenny pointed out, grinning stupidly.  
“Shut up, Kenny,” Stan growled at him, making him laugh. He let out a happy sigh. “I really missed you guys.”  
“Don’t be gay, Stan,” Cartman growled, smacking him upside the head. Stan rubbed the back of his head and glared at him.  
“Ok, never mind,” he said. “I never missed Cartman.” Cartman’s only reply was to grin stupidly at him.  
“If I never see that evil bitch again, it will be too soon,” Kyle commented, staring up at the sky as they walked.  
“You guys are so melodramatic,” Cartman said, rolling his eyes.  
“Look who’s talking, fat ass,” Kyle replied.  
Stan grinned and rolled his eyes, pressing himself closer to Wendy. He really had been missing out. Now he didn’t even know why he had been attracted to Angela in the first place.  
“So,” Wendy said suddenly. “Did you boys want to get your asses beaten at Mario Kart and Mario Party again?” Kenny grinned evilly at her.  
“Oh, you are going down this time,” he said, quickening his pace.  
“I call dibs on Bowser again,” Wendy said, pulling Stan along faster.  
“Oh, come on, at least give us a chance!” Kyle called as he and Cartman raced to catch up with them.  
“Never!” Wendy called back, laughing evilly. And even though they had class in the morning, the five of them gathered in Kyle’s house and they played their games well into the night. Life, for now, was finally back in balance. They didn’t have to worry about crazy supernatural beings pretending to be doctors, or psycho girls tearing them apart. They just had to worry about Bowser Wendy kicking the crap out of them in Mario Party. Again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The End…for now


End file.
